Is a Carbon Tax a Good Idea?

.-.-.- (aka Fullstop) asks: "Cosmos Magazine is reporting that the rate of carbon dioxide emissions has more than doubled since the 1990's. Several researchers fear increased levels may be unstoppable. Australia's national science agency, CSIRO flatly states that current carbon reduction efforts are just not working. Add to this heady mix the fact that Toyota is pushing for a carbon tax and Australia, and the UK, are currently considering one, and a trend begins to emerge. If current reduction methods are not working what will? The United States currently employs a voluntary carbon reduction scheme based on market trading, with very limited corporate participation. Is a carbon tax a good way to stabilize emissions in the face of heretofore failed efforts at stabilization?"

Comments

Yes, but...

[Noryungi]

What I'd really like to see is this:

1. A carbon tax, levied on the f*ng idiots who drive SUVs in the city. Ideally, I'd like this tax to be paid each year, and it's amount to be directly proportional to the oil consumption of the car? Own an SUV? Fine, that will be 50% of its price, every year, as long as you own it. Own an hybrid/highly efficient/electric car? Fine, that will be 5% of its price every year. Don't own a car? Using your feet/your bike/ mass transit? OK, no taxes for you.
2. A carbon and pollution tax, levied on the industries that pollute the atmosphere, water and soil. Same principle as above: send an (independent) team to assess the damage and tax the company accordingly. The more CO2 and pollutants are released, the higher the tax. Inefficient industries will go under and/or will be forced to streamline their productions pretty fast unless they want to pay enormous taxes.
   And let me tell you one thing: most big companies can afford to lose money for a couple of years in order to lower their pollution rate -- sure, it's going to be painful, but everyone will benefit in the log term. Oh, and no outsourcing polluting plants to poorer countries either: the tax should be levied globally, if necessary by using estimates. Outsourcing to, say, India, in order to pollute freely? Sorry, bub, all your plants in India are now considered as "high" or "extremely high pollution": that will US$ 45 million. On the other hand, extremely efficient and non-polluting industries will win.

Still ideally, I'd like the revenue from these taxes to be used to plant trees, create recycling and de-polluting plants, and optimize natural resource usage. Other worthy uses are scientific and technical: developing renewable resources and developing the technologies needed to clean behind us most of the pollutants we have been dumping on Earth for the past 100+ years.

The key point is this: whether you believe in Global Warming or not (I do) the fact is that the Earth is Dying(tm). If we don't force the big companies -- and the individual citizens -- to face up to this fact, all solutions we'll apply to this problem will be too little, too late. There are solutions available right now . Carbon Tax is one of them, and it's probably one of the most effective.

And... Wait for it... Creating new technologies and optimizing our resources consumption may actually increase the wealth of everyone, by creating new jobs and improving/cleaning our habitat.

Of course, I am not holding my breath: most politicians will never have the guts nor the gonads to sign a Carbon Tax into law. We'll probably come around to it once the Earth is so polluted and the climate so out of whack it will taxation or death.

Lack of consensus?

[benhocking]

The whole central problem behind the "carbon" tax is that with the lack of consensus over whether or not fossil fuel emissions are increasing the Greenhouse Effect and producing global average temperature rise -- and frankly, I don't see how it couldn't be having some impact -- there is little or no "tangible" effect that anyone can point to.

If you subtract those people who are receiving money from fossil fuel companies, then as far as I know there is a total consensus on this issue. In fact, even among those people who DO receive money from the fossil fuel companies, you'll find several scientists who admit that fossil fuel emissions are increasing the Greenhouse Effect. (Go to the bottom of this article and see Pat Michaels arguments against Global Warming. Basically it's that "That number [the amount of global warming] is significantly low, and it suggests to me that this becomes a self-limiting issue in the following way: 100 years from now, the technology that runs our society, and powers our society, is going to be radically different than it is today. It will almost certainly be a more efficient, maybe not even a carbon-based fuel society.")

Now, I know people will call this an ad hominem attack, but if it is, it's valid. Just as it was valid to point out that those scientists who denied that smoking was bad for were being funded by tobacco companies. I say it's valid because for the majority of people who don't actually understand the science themselves, they need to consider the biases of those who provide the information. One on hand you have scientists being largely funded by an administration that has very weak on climate issues, but who still find very strong evidence to support the greenhouse gas theory, and on the other hand you have scientists being funded by ExxonMobil and friends who try to find faults with those arguments. It's also worth pointing out that this same group of scientists first denied global warming was happening, then suggested that it's not due to greenhouse gases, and is now claiming that it's not really that big of a problem. So, if you don't understand the science, who do you believe?

Personally, I understand the science fairly well. But it's hard to convince those who don't understand it without pointing out to them why some scientists might be deceiving them (either deliberately or otherwise).

Re:Carbon tax is a good idea

[Anonymous Coward]

What about you, eh? As far as I understand, the US has actually NOT signed the Kyoto agreement?

Oh, and yes, carbon tax is a good idea. In Norway about 80% av the price we pay for gasoline is taxes. The price is what keeps people from driving absolutely everywhere in this country. Taxes on cars are adjusted to how much they pollute etc, to make it profitable to buy an environmentally friendly car.

Re:Yep ... except

[scum-e-bag]

This is a major debate in Australia at the moment. The government ordered a study be undertaken into the future role of Nuclear Power for Australia. The greenpeace crew are all against Nuclear Power. It takes a lot to shift their view. Even when I confront them with Page 79 Figure 7.5 of the resultant report and explain to them that a Nuclear Power plant generates half as much greenhouse pollution as a Solar Power plant, 10 times less than gas power and 20 times less than coal... they are still against Nuclear power... go figure...

Please, read the report, especially page 79 figure 7.5 and see for yourself.

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Factual Error in Parent

[StCredZero]

The Kárahnjúkar hydroelectric dam is in Iceland, not China. And while there are strong objections from environmentalists, I also doubt that 60,000 people have died as a result of this project.

And this got modded up to +4 insightful?

Re:Yes

[RsG]

Why not put a tax on breathing then ? Every time someone breaths out 4% of the gas volume is made of CO2?

Don't be ridiculous.

The Co2 we release via metabolism comes from food. That food in turn takes carbon from the air via photosynthesis (either directly in the case of plants we eat, or indirectly in the case of herbivores who eat plants, and are consumed by us in turn). Every mole of Co2 you breath out, is equal to one mole of Co2 that a crop plant took in. We're carbon neutral already.

Re:Have you ever lived in Europe

[wafath]

Perhaps you mean the Banqiao Dam?

W