Support Policies for Emissions Reduction

Citing an “unprecedented surge in climate-related disasters,” including ferocious hurricanes, devastating floods and record heat waves and wildfires, a group of 14,000 scientists from 158 countries has issued a report declaring a climate emergency. The paper also warns of critical tipping points in the climate system, such as the Greenland ice sheet and Amazon rainforest.

To limit Earth’s warming, the panel proposes a three-pronged policy approach: 1) Implement a significant global carbon price, 2) phase out fossil fuels and 3) protect forests and wetlands because of their ability to store carbon. In addition, pricing greenhouse-gas emissions would be coupled with funding for emissions-reduction and adaptation policies in developing nations.

The National Academy of Sciences advocates putting a rising national price on carbon-dioxide emissions as the most effective way for the United States to meet its emissions-reduction targets. Enacting this policy is the job of Congress. But how can the U.S. facilitate the attainment of a global carbon price?

A recent article in Foreign Affairs, “Competition with China Can Save the Planet,” calls on Washington to build a coalition of countries with carbon taxes and border carbon adjustment mechanisms: fees on imported goods from places that don’t price carbon similarly, thus encouraging China and other nations to adopt their own carbon-pricing systems to gain access to valuable foreign markets. Notably, the European Union is proposing this mechanism as part of the European Green New Deal. 

I’m heartened that Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee have been considering a carbon tax as part of the budget-reconciliation bill, along with rebates to low-income households and a border adjustment. This is a crucial opportunity for climate action that can’t be blocked by the filibuster.

Please contact President Biden and your members of Congress to urge them to support these policies. Passing this legislation would create tremendous momentum to address the climate emergency, and it would set the stage for U.S. leadership at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in November in Glasgow, Scotland.

Terry Hansen

Hales Corners, Wisconsin