It was the rousing debate that might be expected in a state long dependent on — and, in many cases, resentful toward — coal-fired, steam-generated electricity.

The smokestacks of the Four Corners area were the embodiment of villainy in Edward Abbey's environmentalist epic, The Monkey Wrench Gang, and recent efforts to build yet another generator out there are prompting predictable pro-con contests: We've got to have more electricity to serve our customers, say the utility companies. Not at the cost of more carbon in the atmosphere, counter the enviros.

So on Monday, as the state's Environmental Improvement Board took testimony on a petition to cap greenhouse-gas emissions, there were experts and concerned citizens on hand playing to a packed house.

The cap being sought would set greenhouse-gas emission limits, in the next 10 years, at 25 percent below those of 1990. Among the affected industries are oil and gas producers, cement and asphalt plants — and the big polluter, coal-fired power.

Some opponents challenge the very premise that such things are contributing to global warming. They cite goof-ups in pro-environmental research as part of their case that, if there's climate change going on, it's part of a long natural cycle, not the result of the past century's carbon-burning binge. Capping carbon dioxide, goes their argument, won't necessarily slow global warming.

Others concede the need to shift our energy sources to cleaner ones — but say that burning coal, for now, beats big jumps in electricity bills. Nice irony: some of the capitalistas who've wrecked our economy trying to accuse the enviros of imposing economic hardship ...

But how badly will down-the-road emissions caps really hurt? And since Public Service Company of New Mexico and other utilities already are investing in wind and solar power — perpetuating centralized generation and long-lines delivery in the process — why can't they accelerate their move into renewables?

As for waiting on Congress to set emissions caps, lotsa luck: Los Alamos National Laboratory statistician Katherine Campbell, state president of the League of Women Voters, contended Monday that the state can't wait. Inaction, she warned, "is not a choice." And there's economic benefit to reduced carbon burning, goes the environmental view, because fossil fuel is finite; the more we use up, the more expensive it'll become.

Like New Mexico Environment Secretary Ron Curry's courageous move, with a few other states, to demand cleaner-burning cars, emissions caps can't wait on a Congress where key members are the property of Big Coal, Big Oil and other air-chokers. On the comparatively short 10-year term, or maybe a longer one to cut some slack in case "clean coal" proves more than corporate propaganda, the board should live up to its name — and lay groundwork for eventual environmental improvement.