California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is questioning the motives of a felllow Republican, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

(CNN) - California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger - who has backed strict new emissions controls to combat climate change - made a comment Tuesday that's sure to raise some heat, especially in GOP circles.

The Republican governor of California is questioning the motives of a high-profile opponent of the idea: Sarah Palin.

The former Republican vice presidential nominee and former Alaska governor has questioned whether human activity contributes to climate change, and written op-eds blasting the cap and trade policy promoted by the Obama administration to limit emissions. Last week, she called on President Obama to boycott the Copenhagen conference.

"You have to ask: what was she trying to accomplish?" Schwarzenegger, in Copenhagen for the international climate change summit, told the Financial Times. "Is she really interested in this subject or is she interested in her career and in winning the (Republican presidential) nomination? You have to take all these things with a grain of salt."

Palin, dubbed a climate change "denier" by Al Gore, slammed the former vice president for promoting "doomsday scenarios": "Climate change is like gravity - a naturally occurring phenomenon that existed long before, and will exist long after, any governmental attempts to affect it," she wrote in a Facebook post last week.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/12/16/cnn-schwarzenegger-slams-palin/

"Why is Governor Schwarzenegger pushing for the same sorts of policies in Copenhagen that have helped drive his state into record deficits and unemployment?" Palin wrote on her Facebook page Tuesday night. "Perhaps he will recall that I live in our nation's only Arctic state and that I was among the first governors to create a sub-cabinet to deal specifically with climate change."

Palin's comments came hours after the California Republican questioned Palin's stance on climate change in an interview with the Financial Times at the Copenhagen climate change summit.

"You have to ask: what was she trying to accomplish?" said Schwarzenegger, who has backed strict new emissions controls to combat climate change. "Is she really interested in this subject or is she interested in her career and in winning the (Republican presidential) nomination? You have to take all these things with a grain of salt."

The former Republican vice presidential nominee has questioned whether human activity contributes to climate change, and wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post last week blasting the cap and trade policy promoted by the Obama administration to limit emissions. She has also called on President Obama to boycott the Copenhagen conference.

On her Facebook page Tuesday night, Palin said Schwarzenegger was acting "greener than thou."

"While I and all Alaskans witness the impacts of changes in weather patterns firsthand, I have repeatedly said that we can't primarily blame man's activities for those changes," she wrote. "And while I did look for practical responses to those changes, what I didn't do was hamstring Alaska's job creators with burdensome regulations so that I could act 'greener than thou' when talking to reporters."

Palin also mixed it up last week with former vice President Al Gore, who dubbed her a climate change "denier."

Also on her Facebook page, Palin criticized the former vice president for promoting "doomsday scenarios": "Climate change is like gravity - a naturally occurring phenomenon that existed long before, and will exist long after, any governmental attempts to affect it."

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