Cap and trade bill passes in U.S. after historic vote

The bill was approved with with a vote of 219 to 212. Supporters of the bill needed a simple majority of at least 218 votes.

See: Cap and trade vote full results (Final)

The Senate is expected to write its own version of the legislation, which, if passed, must be reconciled with the House version before it can go to President Obama. He called the House vote "a bold and necessary step."

Hours of debate preceded the vote on what has been regarded as one of the most significant pieces of legislation presented to the Congressional floor in decades. Friday's session at the House showed major differences between Democrats and Republicans in their views on the bill.

Republicans had urged Congress to vote against the bill today because they said it will skyrocket energy costs and repeatedly used the term "energy tax" to refer to it.

In opposition, they stated the bill will cause over 2 million job losses in America per year if industries move their operations to countries that do not have controls on greenhouse gases and doubted it will accomplish "dramatic decreases," of greenhouse gases.

Republicans were also against the U.S. taking measures to stave off global warming while major polluting nations such as China and India do not apply similar limits.

The climate bill was designed to slash emissions of greenhouse gases - blamed for global warming. The legislation is also a move to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil and spur creation of green jobs for the clean energy industry, including wind, solar, geothermal power, safe nuclear energy and cleaner coal.

The bill's target is to cut greenhouse gas emissions 17 percent below 2005 levels by the year 2020 and 83 percent by 2050, from 2005 levels.