Climate Politics

Memo to tax sirens: Both a carbon cap and a tax can be implemented well

This is a guest post from David Hawkins, director of the climate program at NRDC.

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In the Odyssey, Odysseus had to be tied to the mast to resist the call of the Sirens, who tried to lure his ship onto the rocks.  These days the siren song of a carbon tax fills the ear of many commentators who urge us to recognize its beauty and steer our ship in its direction.  A Washington Post editorial is a recent example.

The premise of the Post editorial is that cap-and-trade regimes are complex and vulnerable to special pleading, and they do not guarantee success in reducing emissions, while a tax is simple and sure in its effects. But this is grass-is-greener thinking. The Post compares a flawed version of one approach (cap-and-trade) to an idealized version of the other (tax) and not surprisingly, the idealized approach wins.

The fallacy in this argument is that the same political body (our Congress) that, we are assured, will insist on putting special interest features into a cap-and-trade bill, but when presented with a tax approach, will vote only for the purest proposal, firmly rejecting all lobbyists' pleas. Those who argue that a tax approach is less likely to be designed for special interests than a cap approach simply are ignoring the tax code. We have decades of empirical evidence in the U.S. that when Congress designs tax policies it rarely resists the entreaties of special interests.

It is worth reading the history of recent (Nixon onward) energy tax proposals done by the group Tax Analysts. It is hard to see anything in that history that suggests a carbon tax would be successful (or if something called a carbon tax were enacted that it would actually accomplish anything).

The fate of the 1993 BTU tax proposal by Bill Clinton is instructive.

NYT breaks story on CO2 regulations … after two years of Grist coverage

Back in mid-January, Kate covered Lisa Jackson's confirmation hearing, in which Jackson promised to move ahead on the CO2 endangerment finding:

On climate change, Jackson said she would have the EPA declare whether greenhouse gases pose a danger to humankind and need to be regulated -- an action mandated by the Supreme Court, but put off by the Bush administration. "When that finding happens, when EPA makes a decision on endangerment, let me put it that way, it will indeed trigger the beginnings of regulation of CO2 for this country," she said.

Then, this past Tuesday, Kate covered the fact that Jackson announced the beginning of the endangerment finding process.

Back in December, I posted some thoughts on regulating CO2 under the Clean Air Act.

At the beginning of February, the folks from the Constitutional Accountability Center wrote two excellent posts (here and here) on the politics and mechanics of regulating CO2 under the Clean Air Act.

Our own Sean Casten has published at least two interesting posts (here and here) on the technical and legal challenges of regulating CO2 under the Clean Air Act.

And on Tuesday, I posted an extensive analysis of the politics and mechanics of regulating CO2 under the Clean Air Act.

Meanwhile, today, The New York Times finally got around to covering the story.

And lo! The blogs are suddenly abuzz with the news! Friends are emailing me the article! "Did you know about this?!" Our own commenters are saying "This will be the top story here on Grist tomorrow."

Yeeeeaaaaaaaargh!

What does the stimulus fight portend for the climate/energy fight?

The battle over the stimulus bill was the first big challenge of the Obama presidency, and the way it played out is instructive. What will it mean for the coming climate/energy fights?

First, let's get clear on the basic shape of what happened. Obama went into this thinking that an enormous financial crisis and a wide consensus among economists that large federal stimulus is required would be an opportunity to establish an early spirit of pragmatic "post-partisanship." If not in the face of a huge crisis, if not around an indisputably necessary bill, then when?

This is what Obama campaigned on and what he led with in office. He had dinner with conservative pundits. He had extended policy discussions with Congressional Republicans at the White House. He included a far greater percentage of tax cuts in his initial proposal than anyone expected (or most economists recommended). He worked with Congressional Dems to remove some of the small programs Republicans complained about (like re-sodding the National Mall). He did more reaching out, listening, and conceding to the opposing party than Republicans have, cumulatively, in the last 15 years, despite entering office fresh off of huge victories and sky-high public approval.

What did it get him? In terms of Republican support: zilch. Nothing. In the end he got zero votes in the House and all of three in the Senate, after several hundred thousands jobs had been stripped from the package. Republicans carpeted the media demagoguing individual spending programs from the bill and claiming Obama's bipartisanship had "failed" because, well, because they refused to participate. Karl Rove has announced, basically, that Republicans triumphed by giving Obama nothing and that they would not offer him a shred of credit no matter what happens to the economy. The GOP House minority whip says explicitly that he's modeling his leadership on Newt Gingrich. Seriously.

MoveOn preps for gigantic green economy campaign

This hit my inbox yesterday:

When FDR became president, a group of progressive activists asked him to push for some really big changes. His response? "I agree with you. I want to do it. Now make me do it."

President Obama gets that we need to transform our economy. He's passionate about creating millions of green jobs and investing billions in renewable energy. And he's appointed great leaders like Energy Secretary Chu to help him.

But unless we create a massive green-economy movement across America, Obama won't have the mandate he needs to overcome the oil companies and make fundamental change. As president, Obama's extraordinary power comes from the people outside Washington. And that's us.

So we've worked up a big plan to build a green-economy groundswell. It'll mean tripling our field organizing team, mobilizing hundreds of thousands of MoveOn members to take local action, and running ads targeting powerful interests that stand in the way. It'll be MoveOn's biggest long-term campaign ever.

If President Obama is going to transform our economy, he needs all of us standing behind him giving him strength. Are you in?

I'm in!

(But, just to be picky, it's overcoming coal companies that will be the biggest challenge ...)

Green groups outline ideal environmental budget for FY ’10

With President Obama expected to release his first federal budget plan on Feb. 26, environmental groups today pitched their ideas about what should be included. The proposed “green” budget, which comes from a coalition of 27 environmental groups, includes more than $72 billion for green projects. The Green Budget 2010 [PDF] proposal seeks multi-billion-dollar investments […]

Will coal fight continue if governor is tapped for Obama Cabinet?

Coal-battling Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D) is reportedly the top choice to head the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. So if Obama taps her for the Cabinet post, what exactly does this means for the coal fight in her home state, since as a few weeks ago we mentioned that Kansas’ coal lovers […]

Politicos, Pickens hype summit in D.C. next week

Three of the political leaders who will help determine the future of U.S. energy policy — and two guys who clearly want to influence it — spoke to reporters Wednesday in advance of a major energy summit in Washington, D.C., next week where each will speak. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Secretary of Energy […]

James Hansen wants you to join in civil disobedience at the U.S. Capitol coal-fired power plant

Some 10,000 young people will be descending on Washington, D.C., from Feb. 27 to March 2 for the Power Shift 2009 conference, where they’ll be organizing to put pressure on political leaders to take action on climate change. On the last day of the event, they’re the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, the Rainforest Action Network […]

What's up with the Department of Treasury's Office of Environment and Energy?

Am I the only one who had no idea the Treasury Department started an Office of Environment and Energy? Apparently it happened late summer of last year. The office was created by Hank Paulson to ...

... develop, coordinate, and execute the Treasury Department's role in the domestic and international environment and energy agenda of the United States. Among other things, the office will oversee international financial mechanisms to support U.S. and global environmental goals, such as the multi-billion dollar Clean Technology Fund established in July, the Tropical Forest Conservation Act, and the Global Environmental Facility, as well as contribute to the development of domestic and international policy options to address climate change.

There's weirdly little info out there about what exactly the office is and what it will do under Geithner's leadership. The Treasury website says nothing about it.

What does economic 'recovery' mean on an extreme weather planet?

This is a guest essay by Tom Engelhardt, co-founder of the American Empire Project and an editor of the Nation Institute's TomDispatch.com. Englehardt is also the author of The End of Victory Culture and the editor of The World According to TomDispatch: America in the New Age of Empire. This post was originally published on TomDispatch and is republished here with Tom's kind permission.

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It turns out that you don't want to be a former city dweller in rural parts of southernmost Australia, a stalk of wheat in China or Iraq, a soybean in Argentina, an almond or grape in northern California, a cow in Texas, or almost anything in parts of east Africa right now. Let me explain.

As anyone who has turned on the prime-time TV news these last weeks knows, southeastern Australia has been burning up. It's already dry climate has been growing ever hotter. "The great drying," Australian environmental scientist Tim Flannery calls it. At its epicenter, Melbourne recorded its hottest day ever this month at a sweltering 115.5 degrees, while temperatures soared even higher in the surrounding countryside. After more than a decade of drought, followed by the lowest rainfall on record, the eucalyptus forests are now burning. To be exact, they are now pouring vast quantities of stored carbon dioxide, the greenhouse gas considered largely responsible for global warming, into the atmosphere.

In fact, everything's been burning there. Huge sheets of flame, possibly aided and abetted by arsonists, tore through whole towns. More than 180 people are dead and thousands homeless. Flannery, who has written eloquently about global warming, drove through the fire belt, and reported: