Another Republican senator said he’s planning to introduce legislation that would slap tariffs on carbon-intensive imports, an idea gaining traction with the GOP as a climate solution.
(Bloomberg) — Another Republican senator said he’s planning to introduce legislation that would slap tariffs on carbon-intensive imports, an idea gaining traction with the GOP as a climate solution.
“It’s time to take the gloves off,” South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham said in an interview.
Graham said his bill could come as soon as next week. He declined to provide specifics of his plan for the tariff, which generally involves placing a tax on goods, such as cement, steel, aluminum and fertilizer, from countries where products tend to be produced with higher emissions than those in the US.
The so-called carbon border adjustment could be a boon to domestic industries while adding incentives for countries such as China and India to reduce emissions. The idea, already embraced by Europe, also has drawn interest from the Biden administration.
“We’re examining it,” said John Kerry, Biden’s special presidential envoy for climate, said in an interview in the Capitol Thursday. “Europe has one. Others are talking about it. We’re talking about it.”
A handful of senators in both parties have been pitching carbon border adjustments as a way to have a global climate impact while giving credit to US businesses that already run cleaner than their overseas counterparts, including those in the oil and gas industry.
The key Senate backers of the idea who have various bills in the works include Republican Bill Cassidy of petroleum-rich Louisiana, Republican Kevin Cramer of oil-rich North Dakota and Democrat Chris Coons of Delaware, a top ally of President Joe Biden. Senate Budget Chair Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island last year introduced a carbon border adjustment for the imports of products, including fossil fuels, petrochemicals, fertilizer, iron, steel and aluminum, that would have started at $55 a ton.
“We are looking forward to seeing it,” Whitehouse said of the Republican effort. “It makes a negotiating point for the Republicans to work with Democrats and try to come up with something bipartisan.”
Cassidy has dubbed his effort the “foreign pollution fee,” that could ding adversaries like China and block them from undercutting US manufacturers by producing dirtier goods more cheaply.
The European Union’s plans to impose a carbon adjustment gives some impetus to reach a cross-Atlantic deal, which together would provide powerful incentives for the rest of the world to clean up emissions by key industries.
It’s one of the few climate ideas that has much in the way of bipartisan support and could actually bolster the profits of domestic fossil fuel producers and heavy industry. That’s because those industries often run much cleaner than competitors in other countries, Cassidy has said.
Republican backers have pitched it as the “America-first” way to do climate, while Democrats like Whitehouse and Coons have talked up the incentives it creates for global actions to tackle a global problem.
Critics of domestic-focused climate initiatives have noted the risk of what’s called climate leakage, where higher domestic costs can incentivize production moving to countries with higher emissions and, ultimately, little or no benefit for the planet.
Any legislative effort would face long odds of getting through a divided Congress.
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