Working in a Business Development role, I read a fair amount of industry literature, trying to keep up on who is doing what in the power industry.
And of course, I also read the papers, a fair number of blogs, polls and, being involved in politics, have many conversations trying to gauge public opinion on certain issues.
So I found this article in the February 2007 issue of Power Engineering (http://www.power-eng.com/)
Duke Chairman Lauds GHG Tax
Duke Energy Chairman Paul Anderson told Sierra Club members in California that he believes carbon tax legislation is a good idea, “From a businessman’s standpoint, that’s what is going to compel action,” Anderson said, speaking before a gloval warming workshop. Congress is expected to give renewed consideration to a carbon tax, moving away from a cap-and-trade approach that went into effect in Europe in January 2005.
Anderson said cap-and-trade approaches are too flexible, too slow, and too prone to “political mischief” because they can exempt one industry or another. He said taxing carbon emissions will produce immediate, economy wide gains in energy efficiency and carbon-free energy production.
“All the other approaches will take decades,” he said. “A carbon tax is immediate.” Assuming it’s a tax-neutral policy, “it’s really a no-regrets policy,” he said. “If you don’t agree climate change is a serious problem, all you’ve done is create some energy efficiency out there and that’s not a bad thing.”
Generally, I think we’d all agree that the Conservative government hates the idea of a carbon tax, and the Liberals are only coming to it reluctantly after realizing it’s the best way to get quick results on the global warming issue.
But I think that’s because neither have really understood the Green Party’s proposal for Tax Shifting.
Nowhere do we say that we would introduce a carbon tax without a corresponding reduction in taxes paid by Canadians and Canadian corporations.
We would cut corporate and personal income taxes to compensate for the new carbon tax, allowing people and companies generally the same net bottom line.
The difference is that people and corporations would find energy (an other things that generate emissions) would be a greater percentage of disposable income based on their emissions. But since this is to a great extent a controllable expense, there would be incentive to cut emissions in a big way and profit from the efficiency. And as the business opportunity grows to help find new ways to cut emissions, jobs are created and we can go further than we can imagine.
And before any NDP supporters jump down my throat, yes, I am well aware that this places an undue burden on the lower income members of our society, and yes, we will have to help them out in this case. The tax shifting concept is just that, a concept, and we need to be careful to not disadvantage those in society who are unable to change their living arrangements. For example, I’d support free energy audits and some retrofits for people below a certain income level, and some enforcement to ensure landlords retrofits rental units if tenants are paying the heat and hydro bills. I also like the sliding scale, where the first x kWh, for basic needs, are at one price, but anything over that is a significant price jump.
Green Tax Shifting. It just makes sense.
