Alberta's Carbon Tax is Pocket Change to Big Oil

Alberta! Apparently lots of people live there? Who knew!

Alberta is raising its carbon tax to $30 a ton by 2017, but that's projected to only cut carbon emissions two percent. So basically, it’s pocket change for the oil industry because it will barely change their behavior, and the government gets millions in revenue. 

There's plenty of evidence in the states that putting a price on carbon pollution is great for state budgets without hurting state economies. California's carbon cap and trade system raised $850 million last year. Business Insider recently ranked California's economic growth second-fastest in the US, so cap and trade is not exactly crippling its economy.

In the Northeast, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative just raised $85 million in its second auction of 2015. It raised $82 million in the first auction, meaning it's on pace to raise in the neighborhood of $330 million for the year, and continuing to prove that carbon cap and trade works really, really well.

Note that Gov. Chris Christie (R-NJ) pulled New Jersey out of RGGI, and now the state is having to raise taxes to make ends meet. I bet New Jersey could use those millions in easy money right about now.

Imagine how much in revenue Congress and other states are leaving on the table? It’s crazy.

Robert Reich on How to Save the Planet AND Our Economy

Watch this new video from Robert Reich & MoveOn, then read more here:

October's Lesson for Climate Activists: Skate to Where the Puck is Going

Here's what we've learned about Congressional Republicans in October:

• Republicans are so paranoid, they think even mundane legislative procedure is "a political trap."
• Republicans shut down the government and almost crashed the economy, admitted they had no idea why, and ended up with nothing to show for it but historically dismal poll numbers. 
• Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) now opposes his own immigration bill.

It's not just that today's Republican Party rejects all available solutions to all available problems because they don't want President Obama to get any credit for solving any problems. They're willing to create entirely new crises solely in hopes of making President Obama look bad.

Congressional Republicans won't support any legislation that gives President Obama any credit for solving the climate crisis. In fact, if the climate crisis did not exist, the House GOP would be gleefully passing bills trying to create one.

The only hope is that either Democrats can re-take the House or that Congressional Republicans get more interested in problem-solving - as Wayne Gretzky once said, skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been. Climate activists should be planning and power building now for that moment when it comes, hopefully in 2014 or 2016.

Yet I keep hearing arguments like this:

Carbon taxes will also encourage more private investment in renewables because investors are hesitant to invest while congressional action is uncertain. This should appeal to conservatives who dislike government investing in high-tech ventures that might fail. Private investors invest more successfully.

Also, conservatives hate EPA regulations that are expensive to implement and inefficiently only target one industry at a time. Carbon taxes fairly affect the whole economy's emissions simultaneously.

Conservatives also object to reducing U.S. emissions without international emissions reductions. Carbon taxes with border adjustments will impel nations exporting products to the U.S. to pay US carbon taxes or enact their own, thus impacting foreign emissions.

This is skating to where the puck was in 1992. As David Roberts detailed at Grist, since then sane Republicans have been driven from the party. There is no policy nuance that will satiate people willing to blow up DC to end the reign of the Socialist/Fascist Dictator/Weak-Kneed Muslim/Religion-Hating Obama.

Advocate for the policy we need and hope Congress catches up - skate to where the puck is going.

The 3 Things Missing from the Republican Case for Climate Action

Two articles make the Republican case for Congressional action on climate change today, one in the New York Times by former Environmental Protection Agency administrators under GOP presidents William D. Ruckelshaus, Lee M. Thomas, William K. Reilly, and Christine Todd Whitman, and one in the New Jersey Star-Ledger by former Rep. Bob Inglis (R-SC).

1. Republican leaders aren't representing Republican voters on climate action. Poll after poll shows anywhere from 30% to 50% of Republican voters say climate change is happening and we should do something about it, but only a handful of Congressional Republicans advocate climate action. Why aren't Congressional Republicans representing their own voters on climate change? These articles ignore the disparity altogether.
2. No one likes a carbon tax better than carbon limits. Both articles argue that a revenue-neutral carbon tax is superior to Environmental Protection Agency limits on carbon pollution, citing conservative economists who say that's the most virtuous way to go. The problem is that among non-economists, Americans across party lines agree taxes are bad and Environmental Protection Agency regulations are good. Even if it was popular, as Grist's David Roberts has detailed, a carbon tax is trickier than you think.
3. Why is inaction untenable? Neither article lays out the scientific urgency of addressing climate change - for example, the number of American communities that inaction will literally put underwater. Neither article lays out the political urgency - for example, that young voters think Republican climate denial is ignorant, out-of-touch and crazy. Both articles focus on economic solutions, which again, is compelling to economists but won't win you many arguments at a neighborhood picnic. A much stronger case was made by a young conservative Congressional staffer ... who wrote under a pen name for fear of losing his job for speaking the truth about the scientific & political urgency of climate action.

Much like with immigration reform, Congressional Republicans have painted themselves into a political corner: They're screwed in the short-term because they've opposed sensible solutions for so long, they'll get none of the political credit for their passage. But that would leave them screwed in the long-term as the ignoramus party. Wouldn't you rather take the short-term hit and move on to topics that you can win on?

I'd rather these articles have dealt with that reality, rather than blaming "gridlock" and pushing plans no one likes. Where does that get us?

Green Groups Giving Up Carrying The Torch For Carbon Pollution Limits?

In yesterday's post on how we need a climate bill not just individual action on Earth Day, I wanted to include a link to email your member of Congress to ask them to pass clean energy & climate legislation.

So I checked the website of the Sierra Club ... then Repower America ... then NRDC ... then the National Wildlife Federation ... then Greenpeace ... then Friends of the Earth ... and there could have been more ... before I finally found a climate bill action alert at the Environmental Defense Fund. I'm not saying there are definitely no climate bill email links at those groups' sites, but I couldn't find them with a few clicks & quick scanning.

If national conservation organizations aren't going to keep talking about limiting carbon pollution, who will?

I understand House Republicans aren't going to do much of anything that's positive on energy or environmental issues at all this year, never mind try to solve our biggest problems. When it comes to protecting public health & wildlife, we're playing defense this year, beating back attacks on the Clean Air Act & Clean Water Act. And after years of rallying around a climate bill, I can understand mixing in some other issues as well to keep people's eyes from going crossed.

But what I don't understand is the conservation groups' continued focus on compromises like renewable energy standards. If we're in a political climate in which nothing is achievable, why focus on the achievable? If you're going into a negotiation and you know the other person's going to say no, why water down your ask? Why not ask for what you really want?

The next milepost in this debate is January 2013. The House can only get more friendly to tackling the climate crisis, the Senate has about a 50/50 chance of staying where it is or getting friendlier, and President Obama is a good bet for reelection against a weak GOP field.

Now is the time to push the reset button and set the goal for the debate after the 2012 election (there can be plenty of watering down after that). Where do conservation groups want the carbon pollution debate to start? A carbon tax? Cap and trade? Cap and dividend? In a dreary time, let's dream big.

Simpson-Bowles Panel to Skip Low-Hanging Carbon Tax Fruit?

We currently give polluters permission to dump as much carbon pollution into our atmosphere as they want, free of charge. So if the deficit reduction commission led by Alan Simpson & Erskine Bowles was serious about cutting the deficit, asks Matt Yglesias, why not slap a fee on carbon pollution?

The mere fact that the conservative movement is currently engaged in a massive fit of pretending that greenhouse gas emissions aren’t a problem doesn’t change the fact that greenhouse gas emissions are, in fact, a problem. Taxing them would reduce the quantity of greenhouse gas emissions and help mitigate the problem. It also creates revenue.

If Alan Simpson’s reason for thinking a tax on greenhouse gas emissions is a bad idea is that Simpson is a nutcase who doesn’t believe that greenhouse gas emissions contribute to climate change, then Erskine Bowles should have made him write that on a piece of paper. Then we could look at the proposal and know it’s co-written by a nutcase. It wouldn’t surprise me. There are a lot of nutcases in Washington life. But it’s important to know these things.

Even a small tax on the carbon pollution of only the largest emitters like power plants & factories could bring in billions to reduce the deficit. And if the deficit was ever eliminated, you could refund the tax's revenues to all taxpayers equally. Doesn't that make more sense than slashing Social Security? Apparently, conservative Republicans & right-leaning Democrats agree it's more politically palatable to target the poor than to hold big polluters accountable.

Destroying the Planet is Incredibly Economical!

I just booked a round-trip flight from Dulles to Boston on JetBlue for $185. That figure includes taxes & fees. 

I don't mean to complain about a cheap flight. But considering all of the negative societal costs of flying -- intensive reliance on imported fuel, massive climate pollution (not to mention asshole passengers driving flight attendants to leap from their planes) -- it's an incredibly low out of pocket cost.

The Green Miles offsets his carbon footprint through TerraPass, but how many air passengers do that? Maybe a few per plane? Why should I have to pay for my carbon pollution when others can pollute for free? And if JetBlue cared about being accountable for its pollution, wouldn't it work to offset its emissions on its own, or at least offer an offset option at checkout?

That's why we need a national price on carbon pollution -- either through cap & trade or a carbon tax. It's simple, it's fair, it cuts pollution.