The so-called Clear Skies legislation effectively died when members of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee split 9-9 as they voted on the measure that critics say would have significantly weakened existing air pollution controls.

Under Senate rules, a bill cannot be brought to the floor after a split committee vote.

Ironically, the measure gave out its last gasp just hours after the president made a passionate pitch in its support in the heavily industrial state of Ohio, promising "to act to get results" on his proposal.

"To protect the environment, to protect jobs here in Ohio and around our country, Congress needs to get a good Clear Skies bill to my desk now," Bush said Wednesday in front of supporters in the city of Columbus.

But political dynamics on Capitol Hill turned in a different direction.

Disappointed by the bill's failure to address the issue of carbon dioxide emissions believed to be responsible for global warming, moderate Republican Senator Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island defected to the opposition camp.

He was joined by Independent James Jeffords of Vermont, who argued Clear Skies was essentially granting big utility companies "ten extra years to pollute."

The defections have deprived Bush loyalists on the committee of a working majority, sounding the death knell for the measure.

"My vote against (Clear Skeis) is a vote to protect human health," Jeffords explained. "It is a vote to preserve our environment. It is a vote for the people who want to breathe healthy air."

Chafee, who had tried to insert into the bill provisions addressing global warning but was rebuffed by the committee's hardline leadership, said it was "a shame that the US Congress is the last bastion of denial on climate change."

Bush and other bill supporters insisted the Clear Skies initiative would have eventually reduced emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, mercury and other airborne pollutants by up to 70 percent.

But critics charged the bill would have delayed implementation of existing air pollution controls and denied scientific evidence that global warming is caused by greenhouse gas emissions.

In addition, it would have introduced a national rather than local cap on toxic emissions, under which individual businesses would have been able to swap their pollution quotas.

Environmental activists have charged this provision would have amounted to a loophole for big business anxious to circumvent clean air regulations.

Logically, the green community shed no tears about the demise of the Clear Skies bill, which it said from the outset was a misnomer.

"Today senators on both sides of the aisle stood up for the American people against a corporate scheme to weaken federal law and delay the day we all can enjoy breathing clean air," John Walke, clean air project director for the Natural Resources Defense Council, said in a statement.

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