From the “pay and your sins shall be forgiven” department…
FROM KTVU-TV in Oakland:
Officials Approve Controversial Greenhouse Gas Tax
SAN FRANCISCO — Air pollution regulators in the San Francisco Bay area voted overwhelmingly Wednesday to approve new rules that impose fees on businesses for emitting greenhouse gasses.
The Bay Area Air Quality Management District’s board of directors voted 15-1 to charge companies 4.4 cents per ton of carbon dioxide they emit, an agency spokeswoman said.
Experts say the fees, which cover nine counties in the Bay Area, are the first of their kind in the country. The new rules are set to take effect July 1.
The modest fee probably won’t be enough to force companies to reduce their emissions, but backers say it sets an important precedent in combating climate change and could serve as a model for regional air districts nationwide.
“It doesn’t solve global warming, but it gets us thinking in the right terms,” said Daniel Kammen, a renewable energy expert at the University of California, Berkeley. “It’s not enough of a cost to change behavior, but it tells us where things are headed. You have to think not just in financial terms, but in carbon terms.”
But many Bay Area businesses oppose the rules, saying they could interfere with the state’s campaign to fight global warming under a landmark law signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2006.
The title actually plays it down. BAAQMD governs the entire Bay region, from Gilroy to Santa Rosa and from Half Moon Bay to Altamont Pass. Over 6 million people are affected by this, not to mention, visitors.
Not to mention, price increases passed along to out of the area customers.
Nine counties in the bay area. Just like Reagan fought the commie creep, we are going to have to fight the climate creep.
So at an average temp of 57.1 degrees in San Francisco, what are the good people buying for 4.4 cents per ton of co2?
Not to mention businesses leaving the area, and new businesses giving it second thoughts.
If this happens all across the country all our major business will continue to be shipped offshore, especially heavy industry.
“It doesn’t solve global warming”
The tax wasn’t intended to cool the world. It’s the beginning of that newfound way for government to get folk’s money. Governments all over this earth are absolutely salivating at their revenue prospects these days.
Well, I guess one can only hope that the bastion of liberal/communist ideals that is California will one day detatch itself from the mainland by mercy of the San Andreas Fault and spare the rest of us normal folk from such insane principles (which seem to spread outward from Cali). As the Cali high court’s recent ruling on gay marriage illustrates, the power is no clearly longer with the people! These are sad, troubling times indeed when the government will so deliberately and openly over-ride the will of the populace…
‘what are the good people buying for 4.4 cents per ton of co2?’
Tickets to the Poor House.
$4.00+/gal gas will do more to change behavior then a riduculous C02 emission tax.
REPLY: Hmmmm…ya think? See this.
I guess they’ll have to cancel Burning Man.
REPLY: Naw, they’ll just add a surcharge to the tickets to pay for the CO2 depravity that ticket grants them.
This is a good one!-a perfect illustration of polititians in action.
By their own admission it will have no effect on climate nor will it likely affect behavior.
I think the most ironic part is that the tax WILL NOT BE USED to clean anything up! The money will be used to ‘measure emissions’? Is this a new agency? (They can’t say it’s a new agency because if the emissions are not now measured by another agency-how do they know they, the taxable emissions, actually exist?)
Translation: Tax Businesses to Create More Government.
Ummm…how will this be audited? Who sets the standard? How will they know if an individual business has underpaid? Isn’t CO2 (human exhalation) considered a pollutant? Is a tax going to be charged based upon the number of employees breathing on premisis? …If so-isn’t the largest employer the Gov’t? Is the Gov’t going to levy this tax on itself?
Don’t even get me started on city busses and garbage trucks!
Absurd! absurd! absurd!
Since most of the tens of thousands of Bay Area businesses will pay only a dollar or two. I recommend two things to send a message, and I may just help to promote this.
1. Send payment in pennies.
2. Send completed calculation on paper with one word or number per page.
No no no no no no. This is a good thing. The last time SF was up to societal modification for no apparent reason, (they paid homeless a monthly wage to live in the city – not to work – just to live there) it cleared out the streets of Sacramento of pan handlers. Eventually it led to a real estate boom too, as the somewhat normal people of SF decided to become commuters from the Sac area.
I’m predicting a simular boom for commercial real estate in the Sacto area in the near future.
Since when did The Bay Area Air Quality Management District have the right to taxation, without representation too.
Re: “It doesn’t solve global warming, but it gets us thinking in the right terms,” said Daniel Kammen, a renewable energy expert at the University of California, Berkeley.”
Feel good legislation and punishment based social engineering is precisely what the “green”, AGW crowd, and most so-called “environmentalists” are all about. What they propose won’t solve any problems but justifies their existence and salaries.
[snip] Just wait until the state based carbon extortion scheme starts hosing business down. The exodus to come is nothing compared to what it is now.
Yeah, I think that they are doing it now and fast, before the idea of AGW vs CO2 begin to be laughingstock in a couple of months.
And when a tax is voted it is forever !
K.
When the federal income tax started in 1913 the top rate was only 7%. By 1917 it was over 70%. This CO2 tax is a “foot in the door” appproach. Once they set the precedent then the rate can go up and up and up, and spread to other states and maybe the federal government too. Hold on to your wallets!
Dear BAAQMN,
I have 42 Dryopteris bissetiana, 83 Dryopteris celsa, 72 Dryopteris erythrosora, a Sequioa, three Douglas Firs and two acres of ‘blue grass’. My business’s electrical needs are off-grid and new carbon sinks.
Enclosed please find a bill for eliminating 24 tons of carbon dioxide a year. See also the section on late fees and non-compliance fees.
http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local&id=6158179
The big oil refineries will pay the lion’s share. For example the annual fee for Shell will be more than $195,000.
The following are some examples of what some businesses can expect to pay each year.
# United Airlines: a little over $5,035
# PG&E power plant in San Francisco: more than $13,725
# Anheuser-Busch in Fairfiled: just over $1,858
# Guadalupe Rubbish Disposal Company in San Jose: $1,388
Translation:
Consumers can expect to pay more for oil, airfare, utilities, rubbish disposal, and beer.
Sometimes I wish San Francisco would just secede from the Union.
Well lets see the economic growth of san fran stall as business realises the loony fringe have taken over. Might be a good thing as other cities dont want to ruin themselves like San Fran is doing
I recall reading a recent business article stating businesses have been leaving California in droves because of taxes and excess regulations. Many are heading to Nevada, Arizona, and even Colorado. Many others are simply folding their tents and going out of business. This absurd tax will simply accelerate the move.
Jack Koenig, Editor
The Mysterious Climate Project
http://www.climateclinic.com
Re: Echo3Skywalker (11:00:22) :
Unfortunately, the way the fault system runs, it will actually result in Southern Cal, and with it, Orange County,the last bastion of normalcy, being part of the new island nation while most of the Bay Area would remain attached to the mainland. But don’t hold your breath … 4 million years is a very long time.
Robert Wood (13:34:57) :
I long for the day, if ever, that the Federal Government will get local radicals back in line with the Constitution, on this and a number of additional issues (e.g. sanctuary cities, etc). Back in the Stone Age, before the “glorious revolution” of the 1960s, Federal Troops were sent in in response to this sort of illegal behavior on the parts of local governments. But alas, no more.
It is also notable that BAAQMD is an unaccountable, non elected body.
Oh, the joys of de facto, informal “regional government.” (/sarc).
Realize of course that this is not The City of SF doing this. I write this in response to some of the comments I see. This is one of those megalithic “regional bodies” across the entire megalopolis, encompassing not only SF proper, but Oakland, SJ, and all the mass of sprawling suburbs and even a few exurbs. An area the size of Belgium, encompassing 6 – 7 million people, is “regulated” by this. If I recall correctly, the BAAQMD was commissioned back in the late 1960s or early 1970s, as part of a state level Air Quality Act, at the same time as similar bodies, such as the South Coast AQMD, the Sacramento AQMD, etc. Don’t know if it was Pat Brown, or Ronald Reagan, who signed it. The BAAQMD is not an elected body, it is appointed (I believe there are either a certain number of appointees apportioned to each county, or, if not, it is done at the State level, in any case, these are appointed bureaucrats with no real legal authority, in the strictly Constitutional sense).
As much as I would like to see this nonsense greeted by a mass exodus of business from the Bay Area, what I think more likely will be clone legislation in Portland and Seattle followed by similar tax grabs in other major urban centers dominated by like-minded green idiots.
What then? Where will the businesses go?
REPLY: Texas, China, Mexico