Greetings, climate-minded Kossacks! I am a Bay Area software developer who is very concerned about the direction our environment is headed (especially considering the demise of the Clean Power Plan), and I wanted to share a passion of mine I haven't seen mentioned very much around here. Ideally you will find it easy to climb on board; in any case let's get a conversation started.
Citizens Climate Lobby is an international organization that has about 45,000 “supporters” across the U.S. (hard to say exactly how many of these are currently active volunteers) working to get Congress to pass a carbon tax. Pipe dream, you say? Most of us regard it as a pipe dream that absolutely has to come true. Perhaps you saw this headline recently, or this one, from today – emissions are still headed in entirely the wrong direction, with terrifying results, and we desperately need the kind of strong action only bodies like the U.S. Congress can provide. I personally like to think of the marriage equality movement as an encouraging example of what can be achieved when enough people demand change. But that’s what it’s going to take — lots of people demanding action.
Specifically, CCL supports an approach called “Carbon Fee and Dividend.” A mouthful, but all it really means is that we want to tax all CO2-producing fossil fuels as they enter the economy (at the wellhead, refinery, or port), and refund the money collected to consumers, preferably via monthly checks. This is surprisingly easy to implement; most of the records needed are already being kept, and we can use existing institutions such as the IRS to do most of the processing. Fee and Dividend can ramp up injust a few months, as opposed to the many years it takes to establish a cap-and-trade market. It's also much more comprehensive and predictable, which makes it appealing to businesses, economists and physicists alike.
Why do we want to give the money back? Two reasons. The first is that this approach is more attractive to the small-government Republicans with whom we have to work, and who prefer a revenue-neutral solution. But the more important reason (at least to me) is that putting an effective price on fossil fuels is going to make the cost of just about everything rise significantly. Businesses are going to pass these increased costs on to their customers, so it's the consumer who’s going to need to be indemnified. Our studies find that not only do the less well-off 2/3 of the population break even or come out ahead under Fee and Dividend, it adds about $80 billion per year to GDP by putting money in the pockets of people who will spend it.
But won't folks just keep buying gasoline? They'll be able to buy gasoline, for awhile; in other words they'll be able to get to work without going broke in the effort. But since the tax rises every year (did I mention that?), at a fairly early point (my understanding is about $80 per metric ton, less than eight years in), green fuels and technologies actually become cheaper than fossil-fueled ones. So which is Kate Consumer more likely to buy? What about United Airlines?
In the meantime, Fee and Dividend also sends a strong signal both to consumers and to markets: fossil fuels are going away. Soon. Time to move your money into a safer place - the Green economy. While CCL certainly believes there is a role for government-sponsored climate projects, we think the private economy is actually better equipped to do the heavy lifting; we just need to price fossil fuels at their true cost to society.
It may not surprise you to learn that behind closed doors, many Republicans are not climate deniers. They have children and grandchildren like everybody else, and are already seeing their coasts threatened by sea level rise, and their lands menaced by megastorms, megafires, and megadroughts. Our job is to find a way to help them out of the closet, and one way we’ve done this is via the Climate Solutions Caucus, founded in 2016 by Florida Representatives Ted Deutsch (D) and Carlos Curbelo (R). That’s the way the Caucus works; for every Democrat joining they have to bring in one Republican. Currently it’s up to 26 oops, 28 (as of this week) members. Believe it or not, Darrell Issa is one of them; I like to think that the letter I wrote him a few years ago played some role.
CCL volunteers spend most of their time doing two activities: meeting with their Members of Congress (we have a chapter in the vast majority of Congressional districts), and getting letters and editorials into various publications. But we're also heavily invested in networking with business, faith, labor, and other allies. It’s easy for members to find an activity that matches their area of expertise. The times may be depressing, but it’s also a very exciting and busy time for us.
But of course, lots of people don’t have the time to join a new organization, even if they wanted to. That’s why we make it easy for citizens to demand climate action from their Members of Congress. You can follow these links to spend a tiny bit of your day writing, calling, or tweeting your Senators and Representative. In fact, you can even do all three! You don’t even have to support Fee and Dividend; just ask them to do something.
I’ll leave you with a 2015 quote from agw luminary James Hansen (perhaps slightly paraphrased since I can’t seem to dig up the original quote), who hasn’t been wrong about very damn much: “There’s going to be a carbon tax. The only question is, will we get it in time?”