State air board approves 'historic' greenhouse gas rules (CARB - it puts a price on carbon)

Mercury news ^ | 10/20/11 | Mike Taugher - CoCo Times

[NormsRevenge]

California became the first state to cap greenhouse gas emissions across its major industries Thursday when air regulators unanimously approved a plan to allow companies to sell pollution credits as a way to ratchet down heat-trapping gases.

The state Air Resources Board took the action almost a year after a nearly identical plan was approved, then delayed by environmentalists who demanded the board consider taxing carbon as an alternative to the cap-and-trade strategy.

By 2013, refineries, power plants and the rest of the state's top 600 industrial sources of greenhouse gases will have to cut emissions on average by 10 percent or pay to make up the difference.

"It's not an exaggeration to say this is a historic decision by the air board," said Dan Kalb, California policy manager for the Union of Concerned Scientists. "This is California. We have a history of taking action and others following our lead."

The plan was approved unanimously after an all-day hearing.

"For the first time, it puts a price on carbon," said air board spokesman Stanley Young. "This will continue to steer the economy toward clean sources of energy."

Among the 10 top sources of greenhouse gas emissions in California, four are Bay Area refineries, with the biggest last year being the Chevron refinery in Richmond, according to data the air board released this week.

An industry spokesman said refiners supported cap-and-trade over other strategies, such as a carbon tax, but said refiners have a major problem with details in the plan because it requires them to either cut pollution by 10 percent or buy credits in 2013. The industry expected a more gradual approach ..

"That amounts to a potential multibillion-dollar tax on the industry right off the bat," said Western States Petroleum Association spokesman Tupper Hull.

[NormsRevenge]

arbitrary action by an unelected and answerable to no one group.. NRDC-member filled, bent on achieving total destruction of our economy on the promise of new cleaner energies and future.

and you're paying for it.

[Crazy ole coot]

California can say “good-by” to businesses and citizens. Mexico can have it back!

[JPG]

These people are NUTS, N-U-T-S, NUTS.

[Dick Bachert]

The price is our FREEDOMS!!

The late Dr. Jack Wheeler said it best:

"The next president, as opposed to the current one, should have no qualms in laughing at the lunacy of Warmism, the theory of human CO2 production causing global doom. Warmism is the Fascist Left's replacement for Marxism as a rationale for their seizure of power over our lives.

"CO2 is a trace greenhouse gas (95% of the world's atmospheric greenhouse gases is water vapor), and our human production is a trace of that. One tenth of one percent of greenhouse gases are made by man. Humans do not cause global warming, period."

OH, BE STILL MY HEART!!

An embittered former Senator and Vice President Al Gore is seen here leaving the building after a federal appeals court refused to review his 20 year sentence for GROSS HYPOCRICY, FRAUD, UNJUST ENRICHMENT and PERJURY for his lead role as spokesman in the “Climategate” fraud conspiracy. They also had Gore transferred to the California Home for the Perpetually Bewildered after a panel of psychiatrists examined him and declared him to be (and we quote their report) “…crazier than a *hithouse rat.”

The same court recently rejected the appeals of the lengthy sentences of the 137 alleged UN “scientists” – Gore’s co-conspirators – for falsifying data supporting so-called Cap and Trade legislation that trial testimony disclosed would have virtually destroyed what remained of the U.S. economy while unjustly enriching Gore and a cabal of insiders.

During his trial, Gore was notified by the Nobel Committee that he would have to return the large monetary prize and the gold metal awarded him in 2009. He told reporters that the last of his prize money and the 100 million or so he’d bilked from taxpayers while running his scam had gone to the lawyers and Tipper pawned his medal when she left him for a mentally competent achondroplastic dwarf NBA center and filed for divorce after his conviction.

[Gator113]

“This is California. We have a history of taking action and others following our lead.”

THAT is good reason to look forward to it’s complete demise.

I remain concerned for the good California conservatives, but short of a civil war, it sure looks like this state is a lost cause.

[businessprofessor]

What a brilliant taxation scheme! I am impressed by the boldness of the left. This unelected and unaccountable board can just impose tighter emission requirements every year and watch the tax dollars roll in at least in concept. The practice may be somewhat different however. How much effort will it take for major industries to relocate to another state? How much higher energy prices (and prices of all goods dependent on energy) will Californians accept?

Bravo to the left. The rest of the country can watch as California continues to crumble. The left wants to use California as a model to export to the rest of the country. Unfortunately the California voters who tried to stop this madness were outvoted by the leftist mobs in the last election. Why would voters reject tax increases yet not pass the initiative that would limit the impact of CARB32?

[buffaloguy]

“Historic” and “good” are two different qualities that freqently are not correlated:

Napolean marching into Russia in the dead of Winter was historic.
Stalin killing off 45 million Russians was historic.
Kruschev sending missiles to Cuba was historic.

See how that works?

[Iron Munro]

The bureaucrats and the politicians must have discovered that there are still a few businesses that have not gone bankrupt or moved to other states.

[Argus]

Among the 10 top sources of greenhouse gas emissions in California, four are Bay Area refineries

Hey El Doradans, get ready for much higher gas prices, plus rationing. You geniuses you.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

It has long since reached the point where those who own stock in companies in California need to pressure their boards of directors to have strong plans on the table to leave the state.

The best bet would probably be to build an industrial park just over the border in Arizona, where land is cheap and plentiful. So moving production to AZ, then just retailing in California, could save them a huge amount of money.

One of the best projects for both industry and AZ would be to build a California specification oil refinery in southern AZ. CA requires fuels that are so specialized that they are only sold in CA, but AZ needs a refinery as well, since it pipelines most of its fuel from TX. This way, crude oil could be pumped up from Mexico, refined in AZ, then pipe lined to CA as well as Phoenix.

As part of *that* deal, Mexico could also build a natural gas powered desalinization plant in the northern tip of the Gulf of California, sending fresh water north to CA and AZ, and also east for Mexican use.

[spawn44]

This is what happens when IDEALOGS infest our government. This phoney CARDON TAX will not reduce global warming at all, even if there was global warming to reduce. These socialist democrat frauds have bought into the AGW/IPCC CO2
scam, which has been exposed as a political fraud and is collasping under outside strutiny. What it will do is raise your electrical, gas, heating, energy costs through the roof. 2012 we clean house of all socialist democrats and boot their IDEALOGICAL COMMIE rear ends all the way to cuba.

[steelyourfaith]

Just unbelievable. The rest of America should not be forced to bail-out these fools.

 

Beam me to Planet Gore !

[SargeK]

Yes. The arrogance, the hubris is stunning.

“We will continue to steer the economy...” Only a true Communist can believe this garbage.

Californrnia’s last three or four conservatives need to hightail it out of there and head for friendlier climes. The cause there IS lost.

Let them all rot. Kalifornia, RIP. We hardly knew ye.

[hattend]

Just unbelievable. The rest of America should not be forced to bail-out these fools.

The rest of America will be following California's lead within a decade. Revenues to run the state houses'loony socialist ideas have to come from somewhere.