Though the politicians continue to deny its possibility, some of the world’s largest corporations (many of them also its biggest polluters) are already planning for the likelihood of a carbon tax or other financial penalty for industry-generated emissions that are leading the globe towards climate catastrophe.
As the New York Times reports on Thursday:
In a related but separate development, Inside Climate News reported earlier this week how Bloomberg financial services has introduced a new tool for professional analysts and traders who are already calculating how “companies might fare in the carbon-constrained economy” if and when some of the world’s largest energy companies are forced to leave untapped fossil fuels reserves in the ground.
As ICN’s Elizabeth Douglass reported:
But just because the world of business is proving more capable of analyzing what the scientific community has been saying in their warnings about climate change and globale warming, it doesn’t necessarily translate that the world’s mega-corporations will follow the policy solutions offered by the environmentalists, new economy advocates, and the endless train of sustainability experts who describe a vision of a new energy paradigm that upends the centralized hold of big business and the burning of dirty carbon-filled fossil fuels.
Even if the companies cited by the Times, including oil giant ExxonMobil, agree to a carbon tax, the terms under which they might accept such a scheme would likely not include agreements to leave huge reserves in the ground.
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Unfortunately, according to the scientific consensus, that is exactly what must happen, carbon tax or not.
As recent research by Oil Change International shows, fossil fuel reserves are actually increasing even as what scientists call the “global carbon budget”—the amount of carbon the atmosphere and oceans can absorb—is rapidly shrinking.
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“The first rule of holes is simple: when you’re in one, stop digging. We are in a huge hole when it comes to the climate and yet we continue digging our way to climate catastrophe,” said Stephen Kretzmann, Executive Director of Oil Change International. “There is no logical reason to continue expanding our fossil fuel reserves; doing so only continues to line the pockets of Big Oil, Gas and Coal executives while putting our communities and planet in peril.”
Kretzmann’s group calls for an end to fossil fuel subsidies as a way to signal to the big polluters that their support from government is over.
Instead, say experts, that same money should be used to invest in new sustainable forms of energy. Until truly cleaner forms of energy like wind and solar can compete with oil, coal, and gas economically, experts say that there is no way to convince politicians to end the extraction policies of the fossil fuel giants.
As one investment fund expert explained to Douglass: “I’ve talked to quite a few oil and mining companies about stranded assets, and the most consistent message that the companies give is ‘we’re not worried about stranded assets, because if you look at the [International Energy Agency] forecast, the Wood Mackenzie forecast and the BP Energy Outlook, demand is going to keep growing for coal and for oil up to 2030 or 2040. So this is not an issue.'”
In the end, companies like Exxon are about profit and little else. As the New York Times reports:
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