Beam me to Planet Gore !
Posted on 02/09/2008 10:15:09 AM PST by NormsRevenge
In the first such program in California, and perhaps the United States, Bay Area air pollution regulators are proposing to charge an annual fee to thousands of businesses based on the amount of greenhouse gases they emit.
The fee - 4.2 cents per metric ton of carbon dioxide - would affect everything from oil refineries to power plants, and landfills, factories and small businesses like restaurants and bakeries.
--snip--
After years of voluntary measures, the fees, proposed this week by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, set a precedent as the first time that businesses and government agencies would face financial consequences for contributing to global warming. ...
"The climate is changing, and we think that everybody needs to help with the solution and pay their fair share to reduce greenhouse gases," said Jack Broadbent, executive officer of the Bay Area Air Quality Management District in San Francisco.
"This is the next step in addressing the problem. The public is demanding that we be part of the solution."
The air district, a state agency, for the past 50 years has regulated smog in the nine counties around San Francisco Bay - Santa Clara, Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo and Napa, and portions of southwestern Solano and southern Sonoma counties. The air district's board will begin discussing the rule as early as late February and could take a final vote by May.
Almost certain to draw controversy and national attention, the proposal is designed to raise $1.1 million a year, Broadbent said. It is not a "carbon tax," but a cost recovery fee, he said, because the money would not go into a general fund, but would be used instead to pay for the air district's global-warming-reduction programs.
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
I got your emissions right here, BAAQMD.
This has nothing to do with global warming. It’s about raising taxes and growing government.
Under the proposal, all 10,000 “stationary sources” of air pollution that the air district regulates would be subject to the fee, including businesses and government agencies. They would pay it annually as part of getting their overall air quality permit renewed. Small businesses would pay perhaps $10 or less. Large businesses that burn lots of fuel and use large amounts of energy would see costs in the tens of thousands of dollars.
The fee does not affect homeowners or motor vehicles.
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YET!!!
They will be coming thru neighborhoods soon enough with thermal meters checking your chimneys for emmissions soon enough as well.. It’s just a matter of time.
Well why don’t we just penalize all the companies that are providing jobs and tax revenue for the state of California.
Good news for economic development in the other 49 states as far as I’m concerned. Let California drive out every productive business they have left. Maybe some of them will land in my community.
Why not just add the tax to the consumer’s state tax bill? That’s who pays for this feel-good cr@p in the end. It’s a cost of doing business that will be passed on to the consumer. People are so dumb! Yeah! Tax the mean old businessmen! Make them pay!
just another way to tax the citizens of this state.
Once a carbon fee is in place, critics worry, it could easily increase. But that’s the best way to cut greenhouse gases, say some experts.
“I think this is tremendously gutsy,” said Dan Kammen, a Harvard University-trained physicist who is director of renewable energy programs at the University of California-Berkeley.
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Ballsy is a more apt term.
yes it will, their prices will go up and we will be paying the tax
I am so tired of phrases like “The public is demanding that we be part of the solution.” Our representatives don’t represent in so many issues. They survive because they confuse, collude and hide their true intentions.
There is no known methodology to accurately, or evenly closely estimate the carbon dioxide emissions of small point source emitters. That is the underlying flaw of ALL US based carbon dioxide emission estimates (and the Al Gore 1999 IPCC report) and the flaw is amplified the closer to micro level data one looks.
All economists agree that if the goal is to reduce emissions, then a tax on such emissions is the most effective way to achieve that goal. However, a tax of 4.2 cents per ton is not high enough to achieve goal. Why not eliminate the federal income tax, and replace it with a carbon tax of $100 per ton?
Another great lesson on how to get big business to move out of the state. Then of course they will raise taxes on the ones left to make up the difference. Are not Liberals the cat’s meow.
And so it begins.
Follow the money on those "reduction programs."
Dear California Businessmen,
Please come to Texas!
California is becoming Michigan.
Except with one important difference:
Canada has no racial agenda, to reconquer the great lakes.
That is so true, and it goes for Democrats and Republicans alike. This business is such a mess. You'd think CA doesn't care about their economic prosperity. And in the case of many of their legislators, they don't care. They just want to keep the money train flowing from their contributors to them.
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