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SANTA MONICA — California may target the tailpipe in a bid to reduce emissions of the greenhouse gases scientists believe are behind global warming. 

While the United States has pulled out of the Kyoto Protocol to limit or reduce global emissions of the gases, chiefly carbon dioxide, a small group of California lawmakers wants the state to adopt a similar policy of its own. 

“Someone has to pick up the ball,” said Assemblywoman Fran Pavley, D-Woodland Hills. 

Instead of targeting billowing smokestacks, the legislative effort focuses on the state’s love affair with the car. 

In California, an estimated two-thirds of the carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere comes from the exhaust pipes of the 26 million vehicles that travel its roads. Nationwide, less than one-third of total carbon dioxide emissions come from vehicles, with industry and power generation making up most of the balance. 

A bill, authored by Pavley, would require by 2005 that the state adopt laws that result in “the maximum feasible reduction” in carbon dioxide emissions from the state’s cars and trucks. 

Burning a gallon of gasoline produces about 20 pounds of carbon dioxide. Cutting total emissions, therefore, works only by driving less or more efficiently or using alternate fuels, such as natural gas. 

Russell Long, executive director of the environmental organization Bluewater Network and the bill’s sponsor, said automobile manufacturers could meet the bill’s requirements by upping the gas mileage of new cars, selling fewer gas-guzzling SUVs and promoting public transit programs. 

Automakers oppose the bill, AB 1058. 

“The command-and-control approach ... would be pre-empted by federal law, would saddle Californians with higher costs without providing them any benefit, and ignores other more effective and equitable approaches to this issue,” Phillip Isenberg and Steven Douglas, of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, wrote Pavley April 9 in stating the industry group’s opposition. 

Since the Industrial Revolution, the percentage of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has steadily risen. The gas, which acts as a blanket to trap heat that would otherwise be radiated to space, has led to what scientists say is a slow rise in average temperatures across the Earth. 

Over the next century, global temperatures could rise as much as 10.4 degrees Fahrenheit over 1990 levels, according to the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 

Such changes would wreak havoc on California, said scientists in testimony given Friday at an Assembly hearing in Santa Monica on climate change and policy planning.  

Everything from the state’s water supply to its susceptibility to devastating wildfires to its native animal species would be affected. 

“Everything we do is threatened by the specter of climate change,” said Peter Miller, senior scientist with the Natural Resources Defense Council. 

Curbing California’s CO2 emissions would have little material affect globally, however. The state accounts for about 2 percent of total emissions worldwide. 

But lawmakers said the bill, if signed into law, could prompt other states to enact similar legislation. 

“If we’re not doing it at a national level, we can at the state level begin providing steps to reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” said Assemblyman Alan Lowenthal, D-Long Beach.