GHG Emissions, Industrial, Regulation  -  December 21, 2016

Washington governor revives carbon tax proposal

In introducing plan to support pay for teachers and other public school workers,  Washington Gov. Jay Inslee recently proposed a host of new taxes, including a state carbon tax that would charge emitters $25 per metric ton starting in 2018.

The carbon tax as proposed is expected to raise $2 billion for the state, according to The Seattle Times, which also reported that about $1 billion of that total would go toward education with the remainder slated to fund clean energy, water infrastructure, forest health and transportation.

Voters in Washinton rejected a carbon tax ballot initiative in November that included reductions to other state taxes; that measure, the newspaper reported that

a carbon tax ballot measure that also included cuts to other taxes, though that initiative wasn’t supported by Inslee or some in the environmental community.

In addition to the carbon tax, Inslee's plan also calls for new taxes on capital gains and increasing part of the state business-and-occupation tax, the newspaper reported Dec. 13. The new carbon tax proposed in the governors' plan would follow the state's adoption of a cap on greenhouse gas emissions earlier this year for large polluters including power plants, oil refineries, fuel distributors, pulp and paper mills and other industries. 

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