Articles by Alan Durning

A second opportunity to make climate pricing fair

Climate policy offers an enormous opportunity not only to undo our fossil-fuel addiction and build a stable energy future, but also to reverse the natural unfairness of climate change itself.

I've said it before: energy prices are going up no matter what, with or without climate policy. But smart policy can turn rising costs into broadly shared benefits. It can shield working families, fund a shift to a clean future of new technologies, compact communities, and a trained, green-collar workforce.

Building economic fairness into climate policy is a no-brainer: there are several viable ways to make it happen. In my last post, I described a means to it called "Cap-and-Dividend," in which most public proceeds from auctioning carbon emissions permits finance a program of payments to each citizen. Another approach that shields working families from high energy prices (PDF) comes from Robert Greenstein, founder and chief of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. CBPP is the Washington, DC-based think tank that bird-dogs the federal budget on behalf of poor families. Greenstein wrote the plan with colleagues Sharon Parrott and Arloc Sherman.

In short, in this plan climate dividends go only to families with very low incomes, to buffer them from cost increases. It's Cap and Dividend, but only families who need it most get a dividend. Call it "Cap and Buffer." Greenstein suggests compensating the poorest fifth of families for energy price increases and also providing some assistance to those in the second fifth of the income ladder. These families, according to Greenstein, stand to pay between $750 and $950 extra each year for fuel and other goods, once climate policy boosts energy prices enough to reduce emissions by an initial 15 percent. (Without climate policy in place, the only dividends from rising prices are going to energy companies.)

Grandfathering is Robin Hood’s evil twin

Climate change is regressive. Its effects punish the least fortunate the most -- those who've contributed little to and gained little from polluting economies. But the solutions to climate change can be progressive. Done right, they can share fairly the burdens and opportunities of preventing climate disruption.

I said "can."

If poorly designed, climate policy can also be viciously regressive -- a vacuum cleaner sucking up working families' earning. That's why it's so important to get climate policy right. It's the single most important economic fairness issue facing us right now: more important than reforming payday lending, more important even than reforming health insurance. It's what every advocate for economic opportunity should be losing sleep over -- and jumping to action to help shape the solution.

The most needed measure for minimizing climate disruption is a firm cap on emissions of greenhouse gases and a mechanism for putting a price on those emissions. In short, climate pricing. We need to make prices tell the truth about the climate.

Climate change is as much a social priority as an environmental concern

Climate change is a universal menace, threatening hardships for everyone. But it's not an egalitarian menace: everyone will not suffer equally. Perversely, those people and nations least to blame for causing it are most vulnerable to its impacts.

Climate disruption heaps misfortune on the less fortunate, whether in low-lying Bangladesh, the Ninth Ward of New Orleans, or the flood plains around Chehalis, Wash. In the aftermath of climate change, the less you have, the more you're likely to lose.

Cyclists should be more involved as biking advocates

This essay is part of a series on bicycle neglect.

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Blame me. It's my fault the Northwest does not treat bicycling with respect. How? Bear with me, and I'll explain.

Cascadia is, as Washington state legislator Dick Nelson used to say, a "motorhead democracy" -- a place where licensed drivers substantially outnumber registered voters and where car-head dominates transportation thought and debate.

No matter how much good Bicycle Respect would do for our health, communities, economy, and natural heritage, it won't fly in on fairy wings. Bicycle Respect is a political agenda: new traffic laws and enforcement, new budget allocations, and new street designs.

So winning Bicycle Respect requires political power. When many elected leaders begin to see championing the bicycle as a path to higher office, as Portland City Commissioner Sam Adams does, we will be well on our way. When elected officials fear for their seats if they ignore the needs of the bicycle, we will have arrived.