Five western states, many our closest neighbors, have agreed to work together to set a regional cap on carbon dioxide emissions, and join forces in a market-based emissions trading program within 18 months, reports the Los Angeles Times. The five are California, Oregon, Washington, New Mexico and Arizona.

Most have Democrats in the state house, or in the case of California, a governor who has to play nice with Democrats and steer a middle path, but the list still raises the question of where is Nevada on this?

It’s not like we don’t have a lot to contribute and it’s not like we have a huge coal industry to protect - although some rural counties are intent on building coal-fired power plants that wouldn’t be acceptable in Clark or Washoe counties. But surely, even if you don’t think global warming is a real threat, enough people do believe it’s a problem, that there is a real busines opportunity going wasted.

Princeton economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman recently pointed out that energy conservation hasn’t killed the California economy but over the last generation, the state has managed to grow with a shrinking share of the nation’s energy. (You can read it here but you need to be a Times Select subscriber.)

It’s really strange that Gov. Jim Gibbons has not included Nevada in this. We already have some hydro-power, which is green and Las Vegas is relatively compact, so despite traffic problems we probably use less gas commuting than either Southern Californians or Phoenicians. And we have plenty of federal land that could easily be turned to solar projects as that becomes a more efficient technology.

And even if all these calculations are wrong, it would be good to hear why former Congressman Gibbons championed geothermal energy for local constituents but as governor can’t grasp the big picture beyond oil company talking points. At least, we should have reserved a place at the table rather than sitting the whole thing out.

For any green energy proposals to work, they will have to make business sense. (If you don’t believe that, look at the mega-deal for TXU. Part of the deal at least has the appearance of being green - it reduced the number of coal plants, reports the New York Times. And even if more coal plants are built by other utilities, the owners have to promise to use new "clean" technologies.)

It’s about time the state abandoned the zero-sum thinking about energy. That was so 1970s, the kind of rhetoric used to lambaste Jimmy Carter for turning down the thermostat and putting on his cardigan.