Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Climate-changers miss the point

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Voters in Washington state will be asked next month whether they want to adopt the nation’s first carbon tax — a powerful way to curb greenhouse-gas emissions. You’d think environmen­tal groups would be doing everything they can to back that idea. You’d be wrong.

Initiative 732 calls for a $25-per-ton carbon tax, and it says the proceeds should be used to trim the state sales tax, cut taxes on manufactur­ers and give tax rebates to low-income households.

Oddly enough, this plan has failed to impress some environmen­tal campaigner­s. Washington Conservati­on Voters opposes it because none of the revenue would go toward clean energy. Climate Solutions agrees. The Sierra Club won’t back the plan, saying its help for low-income households is insufficie­nt.

These groups haven’t put their own proposal on the ballot, so they’re saying it’s better to do nothing than vote for Initiative 732. This is absurd. Curbing carbon emissions ought to be the primary goal, especially since 732 also could prove the viability of a carbon tax and set a valuable example for the rest of the country.

The question of how the carbon-tax revenues should be used is worth debating, but what matters most is to put a price on carbon, reflecting its true cost to the environmen­t. Promising that revenues from the carbon tax will be used to cut taxes and support low-income working families seems wise, in fact, because it lends the idea bipartisan appeal. But the point is that the measure shouldn’t fail because it doesn’t please every group on every point.

The latest polls show 42 percent of respondent­s supporting the plan, with 37 percent against and 21 percent undecided. So it could go down.

It would be bad enough for the measure to be voted down because climate change wasn’t seen as an urgent problem. If it fails for lack of support from climate campaigner­s, that would be a shame.

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