British Petroleum may be public enemy number one for its drilling disaster in the Gulf, but oil company Valero scored a public relations coup yesterday by qualifying its ballot initiative for the November election. Valero, which has a refinery in Benicia, and Tesoro, a Texas-based oil company, are the main funders of a campaign to freeze implementation of AB 32, California’s groundbreaking climate bill.

The California Jobs Initiative is the name of the ballot measure, and it would halt AB 32's capping of greenhouse gases created by businesses—until unemployment drops to 5.5 percent. Right now, the state’s unemployment rate is about 12.7 percent. Supporters of the oil companies’ campaign say that the state’s economy would suffer if strict carbon emissions rules are put in place, and job creation would be slowed.

Opponents say that the oil giants simply don’t want to clean up their own pollution. As The Bay Citizen reported last month, Valero in 2008 was the seventh largest polluter in the state, according to the California Air Resources Board. That year, its refinery and asphalt plant emitted 2.8 million metric tons of carbon dioxide.