In Federal Void, States Ramp Up Greenhouse-Gas Control Push

摘要

With the federal government now taking a back seat on climate change, states and cities are accelerating their own initiatives to control greenhouse-gas emissions through carbon dioxide (CO_2) cap-and-trade programs and carbon-use taxes. Sean Penrith, executive director of The Climate Trust, terms the 2017 momentum "extraordinary" and predicts a quickened pace this year, even though some measures face hurdles.The Washington state Senate on Feb. 1 moved forward a bill that would impose a carbon pollution tax on the sale or use of fossil fuels to generate power and the electricity from those fuels. Gov. Jay Inslee (D) has long favored a clean-energy economy, but federal cap-and-trade legislation he supported as a U.S. congressman failed and his executive order setting an emissions cap was struck down in December by a state superior court judge. Voters rejected a 2016 ballot measure for the nation's first carbon-emission tax on fossil fuels and fossil-fuel-generated power, with proceeds to have offset sales taxes.