00:03:39.080I think the answer is something that more and more of our sort of mainstream society
00:03:45.300is becoming aware of, and that is that the populations and communities
00:03:51.020that have always had the least and been treated the worst
00:03:56.360are those who've borne the brunt of the fossil fuel industry's impacts.
00:04:02.140And historically, that's primarily been from point source pollution in the form of environmental injustice from whether it be fracking sites or oil fields or coal mines, the communities that bear the pollution that is directly emanating from those sites,
00:04:26.920whether it's soot or mercury or contaminated water sources and everything that follows,
00:04:35.920whether it's hotspot concentrations of cancer and other diseases or stunted growth, work abilities, whatever it is,
00:04:48.920that's really been here since the beginning of industry.
00:04:53.920And what we're seeing now is that the more globalized effects that are further apart in cause and effect or kind of the time of the pollution and the place of that pollution and then the ripples out through our ecosystem and our climate systems, that's what climate change has done is sort of extend those impacts of the fossil fuel industry across time and space.
00:05:22.620And yet it's still those communities who've had the least and been treated the worst that are bearing the brunt. And what we see in the United States is similar to what we see worldwide. Those are young people, those are the elderly, those are people of color, that's women and the poor.
00:05:41.660I think it's really important that we begin to understand the disproportionate effects
00:05:51.660So thank you for going into that a bit.
00:05:54.740And I think about that due to these tremendous social costs generated by fossil fuels, many
00:06:04.020have called for a, and I might mispronounce this, but a Pigovian tax, which is a tax on
00:06:10.380any market activity that creates negative externalities in order to correct an undesirable
00:06:15.100market outcome like high taxes on cigarettes or taxing plastic bags for example so i'd like to
00:06:22.740talk to you about carbon taxes and carbon pricing by breaking it down one by one because there are
00:06:30.420just so many moving parts which to its detriment i think causes some to shy away from the subject
00:06:36.260But ultimately, your argument is that the best way to fight climate change is to make carbon pollution expensive by making carbon a part of the market.
00:06:47.180So maybe you could begin by explaining the two mechanisms of pricing carbon and which one you advocate for.
00:06:54.060Absolutely. So yes, Pigovian taxation is named after an English economist in the early 20th century, Arthur Pigot, who advocated for, kind of really showed the world how the tax code can be used to address societal ills.
00:07:13.620And we've seen how imposing taxes, sometimes called sin taxes, on what we as a society decide we want less of can really work.
00:07:26.160And cigarette taxes are a prime example of that, that above all of the advertising and public education and awareness work that nicotine is addictive and cigarettes cause cancer when smoked, it was really the imposition of the cigarette taxes.
00:07:46.100And especially in the case of young people that where we saw their use decline in popularity.
00:07:53.960And so there's there's a really direct relationship between what we buy, consume and use and and the price for those products and services, which is intuitive, I think, to all of us.
00:08:08.420We know that when there's, you know, two products on the grocery shelf, and they look more or less the same, we're going to go with the one that's cheaper. We're all looking out for kind of our bottom lines and, and trying to save money, which is time and resources to direct the things that matter most in our life.
00:08:29.760And so the idea of taxing carbon has been around for decades. As soon as it was clear that we had an unfolding climate crisis driven by the overuse of fossil fuels, economists and policy experts started thinking about how the tax code could again be put to use given the ubiquity of the product and our ubiquitous dependence upon it.
00:08:59.760Like you pointed out in the beginning of the episode, there's so many different infractions with fossil fuels every day, many of which are completely invisible, except for that point of sale, except for when we pay the bill for gas or electricity or the gasoline at the pump.
00:09:18.480Um, those are obvious points at which the price of fossil fuels is, uh, right there in an obvious
00:09:25.620way, but it's invisible in the ways, uh, that it shows up in back to the grocery bill or our clothes
00:09:34.240or, um, our, the actual car or even bicycle that we buy or, um, paper or, uh, vacations,
00:09:44.580Whatever it is, I mean, we're using fossil fuels for energy to power all these different elements of our life, and that's why we have to think about the price kind of secret that we can unlock that would allow for the dirty fuel that might be replaced by a clean one to show up so we can make those choices, especially when it's not an obvious matter of just switching our utilities.
00:10:09.320We need that price signal, as it's called, to be sent throughout the economy, throughout all the goods and services that I just mentioned and all the ones that you might be thinking of, so that two things happen.
00:10:20.160One, we have the incentive to look elsewhere.
00:10:26.480If the price of fossil fuels and all the things that are made with fossil fuels go up, then we as consumers will start looking for alternatives that are cheaper.
00:10:37.980And we as investors and business people and entrepreneurs will start producing those alternatives.
00:10:45.740The most obvious example is in the form of electricity. Why burn electricity or use
00:10:53.180electricity that's generated from burning coal when we can use electricity that's generated from
00:10:58.720the sun? Well, in many cases, it's been because that conventional electricity is cheaper. If the
00:11:08.000renewable electricity becomes less expensive than the fossil fuel-based electricity,
00:11:12.880then we all shift over consumers shift over and investors and entrepreneurs and business people
00:11:20.200to provide the solar electricity that we might use so so that's that's one benefit of putting
00:11:27.420a price on carbon is that it it really allows all of us who are buying and selling and goods
00:11:34.500and services to participate in that transition together and have the incentives aligned so that
00:11:39.440it works out the second reason and then i'll get into the mechanisms by which we can do this
00:11:44.000is that uh we need to conserve energy it's it's really not just a matter of replacing
00:11:50.820the energy that we use from fossil fuels now with renewables because we for instance as as
00:11:58.380americans consume at least four planets worth of resources um if if the whole world were to live
00:12:05.480like we do on average so we know that we're consuming at this insanely unsustainable rate
00:12:11.240and a large part of that is because we're wasting energy like nobody's business i mean
00:12:16.060think about the combustion engine of a regular gas powered car i mean it it it loses incredible
00:12:25.120amounts of energy in the form of uh heat well why why are we burning a fuel uh that generates you
00:12:33.960know not only the power to move the wheels but all this excess heat that just goes nowhere we're not
00:12:38.900using it there are other kinds of engines other kinds of ways of getting around that we can use
00:12:43.300that are more efficient but we need to have reasons to become more efficient as long as that
00:12:48.980gas is cheap the companies that sell it are going to keep us hooked to it um and so so we need
00:12:56.920reasons to conserve and and we know that whether it's it's turning off the lights or choosing to
00:13:03.300vacation closer to home or buy local produce or, you know, what have you, if you have to pay more
00:13:11.640than you're comfortable with, then you're not going to do it. And that's, that's a really
00:13:16.340powerful driver of energy efficiency. So the ways that we can price carbon are, um, most directly
00:13:23.140are through two policies. The first that you might've heard of is, is cap and trade and the
00:13:28.600other is a carbon tax. So cap and trade is when the government sets the cap or the limit on the
00:13:36.160amount of pollution that we want to allow as a society. And as we know, that needs to eventually
00:13:42.760reduce over time to zero. In fact, by 2045, 2050, it needs to reduce to zero. So the government
00:13:51.900sets that cap and reduces that cap over time. And then the market per se sort of responds
00:13:59.140by setting the price of that pollution. And the way this works is that the government holds
00:14:06.640auctions for the sale of permits to pollute the amount of total pollution that's allowed under
00:14:14.780that cap. And over time, as the cap reduces, the number of permits also reduces. And what we know
00:14:23.980from basic supply and demand in Econ 101 and from the experience that all of us have in our lives
00:14:30.040is that when something becomes more scarce, it becomes more valuable. So the permits become
00:14:36.400more expensive over time as that cap declines over time. The carbon tax works, it results in
00:14:45.240the same outcome of pollution now having a price and being something that we want to avoid,
00:14:51.300but it does it with the inverse sort of relationship between the government and the
00:14:56.740market. The government, instead of setting the limit on pollution as it does with cap and trade,
00:15:03.100it sets the price of pollution so the government sets the price per ton of carbon or carbon dioxide
00:15:10.180equivalents that's allowed or rather that that we're that we're emitting that we're producing
00:15:16.240and then as that price goes up over time then the uh society responds by limiting our pollution
00:15:25.800so so that the price is known the amount of pollution is not known but what we know
00:15:32.340is that as the price goes up, we'll pollute less.
00:15:35.900And there's a lot more that I can get into on those,
00:16:01.400it seems like in many ways we do uh we actually need to be able to put numbers on things like
00:16:09.900pollution putting these cap and trades and you know i have a lot of mixed feelings about it that
00:16:14.500we can get more into as the interview goes but um when we're still like i said entrenched in
00:16:21.120this capitalist system it's kind of like using the uh you know using the tools that are already
00:16:27.080there to try to change it from the inside out. And so I do see a lot of benefit and it's really
00:16:33.420interesting to learn about the intricacies of it. So I really do want to hear more. And I'm also
00:16:39.320hearing Tom Goldtooth's interview in my mind, who's so against cap and trade and so against
00:16:45.380programs like REDD because he feels that it's just a way to commodify the air. And it also
00:16:53.880affects indigenous peoples in south america because for instance red this program can kick
00:17:00.600indigenous peoples off their land in order to protect these forests for carbon sequestration
00:17:06.440or yeah like as a way to sequester the carbon that companies can pay for these forests so that0.99
00:17:12.980they can trade it with their pollution so i know that it can get kind of um messy and so i guess
00:17:20.540this question i'm conjuring is you know what are the pitfalls of carbon trading or cap and trade
00:17:26.940especially given that interpol has stated that the 176 billion dollar carbon market has become
00:17:34.500rife with organized crime so how has the cap and trade system fared for the many say east coast
00:17:41.980states who have had cap and trade system in place since 2009 great points um so the first thing i
00:17:50.520want to say and and very clearly is that carbon pricing is a term that encompasses a multitude of
00:17:58.660policy specifics the two main options i already outlined there's cap and trade there's carbon
00:18:04.540taxes but within even those two ideas there are so many ways that you can go about this
00:18:12.580And the devil really is in the details, because each policy arrangement will reflect a different set of values.
00:18:23.320And the same power and force of the fossil fuel industry that could turn an alternate policy approach into something very bad exists for carbon pricing.
00:18:38.000No policy solution is immune to the power of the fossil fuel and other industries to corrupt its purpose and turn it into something that we don't support.
00:18:50.880And I think right now, or recently, there's been a lot of critique of carbon pricing that's not including the whole universe of potential climate policies and the ways that those two can be corrupted and those two have been put into effect with maybe not the kind of outcomes that they were intended for.
00:19:15.560So with that said, Tom Goldtooth and the Indigenous Environmental Networks, I think important work to point out where cap and trade in particular can go wrong, that many of those critiques are 100% spot on and I think really merit debate.
00:19:37.240So one element that they're zeroing in on is the offsets that can be included in cap-and-trade policies.
00:19:48.460And I say can be because they're not an inherent part of a cap-and-trade policy.
00:19:54.500They are an option that can be added on to defray the costs of transitioning away from dirty energy, primarily for the industries that lobby the loudest not to bear those costs.
00:20:12.460So this is just like pure political economy that if those industries weren't so effective, then things like offsets wouldn't probably be on the table.
00:20:24.500And offsets alone themselves aren't even a terrible idea. It's the kinds of offsets that are being proposed. And this is where it can get very complicated.
00:20:37.060But I think one rule of thumb to consider is that the closer to home, to where that policy is being enacted, that an offset is being valued.
00:20:53.080The work that is actually taking place to reduce emissions that then is is sold for a company that might not reduce emissions in its own operations, but instead purchases that offset for credit to meet its obligations under the cap on pollution.
00:21:11.880That's how that's how an offset works. The closer to home that that actual change is happening, the better.
00:21:19.060And so the red markets, the forest kind of global carbon credits from forests in the world, sometimes those are very, very far from home.
00:21:30.080And it's not to say that the closer, the better all the time, but the more complexity you introduce in time and distance, the more loopholes and the less scrutiny there is.
00:21:43.060And so it's true that some of these programs to pay indigenous peoples to not live in their homeland and not use the forest and inhabit the forest in the way that they have, have gone terribly wrong and might be a model that we just shouldn't contemplate.
00:22:08.340But there are other examples within our own country where offsets have been very productive and very helpful where there are private forest owners or farmers or entrepreneurs who are receiving an income doing the right thing when they otherwise wouldn't have any revenue to support that activity and would therefore not be able to do it.0.61
00:22:34.180So for instance, there's private forests in the Northeast, I believe in Vermont even, that is being supported by the Californian cap and trade program. And that's allowing forests to remain standing instead of, you know, cut down.
00:22:53.000and that is something i think that we would all support so that's again the devils in the details
00:22:57.500like what are we talking about when we critique carbon pricing what are we talking about when we
00:23:02.620critique offsets it's also true that that that political force that puts offsets in place and
00:23:09.900especially those that are more difficult to vary verify more controversial incorporate you know
00:23:15.900human rights abuses that will exist for for any policy and it could exist for a carbon tax in the
00:23:23.060form of exemptions it's just actors not wanting to pay for for pollution not wanting to transition
00:23:31.420that are looking for a way out so i just i i want that to be very clear that the critiques against
00:23:37.500carbon pricing are not critiquing the overall idea and and to your larger point you know is it right
00:23:43.660to basically commodify the earth um that's actually not how i see carbon pricing at all
00:23:50.840i see it as a basic tool of justice because it's just wrong for private industry to use our public
00:24:04.500skies as a dumping ground and it's just wrong for private industry to reap untold profits
00:24:12.200The fossil fuel industry is the most wealthy industry that has ever existed in human history, and it's wrong that they get to just be as greedy as they want to be at the cost of our lives and our futures.
00:24:28.620The fact is that a price is going to be paid, but right now we're the ones paying it.
00:24:33.700We're the ones who are paying for their bad behavior.
00:24:39.300And that basic tenet of justice is that the person responsible for causing harm should
00:24:47.140be the one who bears the cost, who bears the consequences.
00:24:51.760and carbon pricing more than any other policy tool most directly forces the the companies
00:25:02.140causing climate change to bear the costs instead of us and and it's not to say that there aren't
00:25:10.840other ways to to shut them down and to transition to other ways of living and using power but
00:25:19.380carbon pricing is the only policy tool that generates revenue that takes the money from
00:25:27.540the fossil fuel industry by taxing them or requiring that they pay permits to pollute.
00:25:35.100And then that's a pool of public funds. It's like we're reclaiming the value that belongs to us
00:25:43.620all. We're making it public again. We're reclaiming the commons, I would say. And that pool of funds
00:25:51.760that is managed by the government, which if we can defend our democracy is in turn managed by all of
00:25:58.880us, returns to all of us. And the kind of carbon pricing that I most love and think holds the
00:26:06.740greatest potential to really serve the justice that is due is a carbon fee and rebate or carbon
00:26:15.280tax and dividend policy where the funds raised from making polluters pay are divvied up in equal
00:26:22.840amounts and sent back to every individual that lives in the state or the country that that policy
00:26:30.860is being enacted in. And that makes for extraordinarily progressive distributional
00:26:37.740economics. So the people who are paying the most in their health and their livelihoods and their
00:26:45.060actual dollars are benefited the most proportionally. It gives everybody a ticket,
00:26:51.680kind of a golden ticket into this transformed economy. It doesn't just let some people get
00:26:58.680the benefits and others left out in the dark. And psychologically and morally, I think that
00:27:05.380holds tremendous importance. And it makes sure that everybody has the means to then transition
00:27:13.900their lives over to clean energy and energy efficient modes that initially, before they
00:27:21.760become the status quo options, can be a little bit more expensive. So it gives everybody cash.
00:28:28.680Polluters are still polluting. We're still using the fossil fuels. The majority of us listening to
00:28:35.160this podcast are directly entrenched in the fossil fuel economy, even if we don't work for
00:28:41.940fossil fuel industry. Whether we have cars, we heat our home, we cook, you know, we have a phone,
00:28:49.880we have a computer we you know all of these things they add up to some type of pollution
00:28:58.220resource extraction and so part of me says you know what this is the system that we're in right
00:29:03.060now we need to use the tools we need to robin hood as much money as we can from the fossil fuel
00:29:08.720industries and distribute it and of course then the other side of me goes oh my gosh like this
00:29:13.880could be, whether it's the money that's these dividends could be, you know, the cream could be
00:29:21.720taken from the top and used in ways we don't see fit, like taxes in general. I mean, how many times
00:29:27.640do you or your friends or somebody goes, oh, I don't want to pay taxes. The money doesn't even
00:29:32.160go to what I believe in, or where is some of the money going or who does, who gets the contracts?
00:29:36.940You know, we know that there's so much messiness in politics and how money actually does get
00:29:41.680distributed at the end of the day and who's taking benefit from it and who's involved and
00:29:46.520who isn't. So part of me says, if this could work, honestly, if this could work, I do see a lot of
00:29:55.360benefit to it. And I also have this very skeptical side, not because I don't want it to work and not
00:30:01.220because I don't think that there is a lot of, honestly, kind of mandatory essence to this,
00:30:07.300But I know that just the way our government is set up as it is and how corporations get away with so much.
00:30:14.660And even like I think about the Exxon Valdez oil spill and even Exxon Mobil was saying, oh, well, we'll give this many millions, billions of dollars.
00:30:22.220And of course, after years and years of them then suing, I think, the state of Alaska, then they ended up having to pay out not even a quarter of what they originally said they were.
00:30:31.240So I just know that there can be so much of that in these types of large-scale projects, especially when they're in cahoots with the government and fossil fuel industry.
00:30:43.460But I want to just for a minute go back to what we were previously discussing with climate change and air pollution having disproportionate impacts on Native nations, people of color, and low-income communities.
00:30:57.920and globally indigenous peoples have rebuked market-based mechanisms like carbon trading
00:31:03.520as this false solution to climate change so maybe you could speak a little bit to whether or not
00:31:08.820these communities could be accommodated specifically under rebates because as the
00:31:14.320our climate website states a carbon price alone is regressive so how can policy protect those who
00:31:22.020are the most vulnerable? I think the answer is yes. And it's been very inspiring to see,
00:31:28.260for instance, the coalition that fought very hard and came close to passing a carbon tax in
00:31:36.740Washington state. They partnered, as I understand it, quite closely with Native people in Washington
00:31:45.000and tribal governments and that model is another one that's that's quite popular among much of the
00:31:53.800progressive movement behind carbon pricing which is to use the revenues not as lump sum like
00:32:01.840individual payments but for compensating communities as a whole that have been and are
00:32:10.680most hurt by fossil fuel pollution and and kind of our status quo power system and that that model
00:32:18.440comes out of uh one success in in california uh where you are with the cap and trade system there
00:32:25.040that was modified thanks to the advocacy of of groups like green for all to distribute 25 of
00:32:32.900the revenue under cap and trade to low income and communities of color in areas that are most
00:32:40.020impacted by mega freeways or lack of access to transportation and poor housing. And so those
00:32:48.280funds can be distributed more in the forms of grants or any other mechanism that's not individual
00:32:57.600but collective within a boundary of identity, I guess. I think that having a combination of those
00:33:06.920is one way to go about it, because if you only return the money to specific constituencies,
00:33:14.500people all are going to fall through the cracks, and they might be the people that we most want
00:33:19.060to help. So you have to have something in there that distributes the revenue on an individual
00:33:25.020basis, especially because the California model doesn't necessarily apply in states like
00:33:30.900my home state, Oregon, where there aren't the same concentrated environmental justice
00:33:37.520kind of communities, but there's more diffuse poverty and it doesn't always
00:33:42.500follow along racial lines. And so getting money back to individuals in a really transparent way,
00:33:51.260make sure that the policy as a whole isn't regressive. And that's the design that we went
00:33:57.460within the dc campaign which i've been leading for the last uh few years it's since transformed
00:34:04.000away from a carbon pricing policy not because the coalition wanted it to but because uh the
00:34:09.800council member positioned best to lead on environmental issues just really prefers a
00:34:15.900mandate approach but that's a story for another time um anyhow the the policy that we as a
00:34:21.280coalition formed through this 100 percent consensus rebated the the vast majority of the
00:34:28.780revenue you know 70 75 percent back to uh dc residents in a per capita per capita basis and
00:34:37.980then 20 of the funds were used for community green investments and then the remaining five were
00:34:45.940tax credits for area businesses. And we designed that policy from this kind of moral values
00:34:57.020framework, but also iterating through economic modeling to make sure that it would be on net
00:35:03.820a positive economic boost for the district. And it turned out that we didn't need to give
00:35:08.820a very big tax credit to locally based businesses because the economic activity generated from
00:35:18.700people having that extra cash in their pockets and cycling that money through the local economy
00:35:24.880was going to be a benefit to them, especially to restaurants and local retailers.
00:35:30.400And so, so I think that there's a way that there are most certainly ways to design a policy that end up being very progressive and very inclusive and, and net benefiting to the, to the communities and individuals who are, who are treated, treated the worst right now.
00:35:52.160Thank you for that. This whole time, I've also been wondering, how is big oil responding to
00:35:58.940these policies? I know that Exxon has been talking about a $50 a ton carbon tax, which to me indicates
00:36:06.300that if this is the number they are suggesting, that it's clearly a number that will cause zero
00:36:11.820pressure on their business. And in Washington state initiative 1631, which would have created
00:36:18.200a carbon fee of $15 a metric ton, and then used the $2.3 billion generated in a five-year period
00:36:25.460on clean energy and green jobs, was ultimately defeated after the oil industry spent $30 million
00:36:31.800opposing this initiative. So yeah, I'd just love to hear your thoughts on that.
00:36:38.120Yeah. It's true that a lot of the bigger kind of corporate players that are even
00:36:47.040talking about any kind of environmental policy would prefer a carbon price over other policies
00:36:53.540as would many small businesses who you know certainly don't oppose climate action but just
00:37:01.080see the benefit of a market-based approach that allows them to transition what they what they
00:37:09.340produce over time with this sort of like more graceful glide path off of whatever more polluting
00:37:17.620product they're they're producing now in a way that um sometimes a mandate approach is a little
00:37:23.240bit more stark a little bit more you know today you can do x tomorrow you can't and it and it's
00:37:28.660a more expensive process to retool but there's also i think from especially from fossil fuel
00:37:35.260companies like Exxon, there's a good amount of greenwashing going on and people are right to
00:37:42.240look at that skeptically. I think it's positive for the sake of bringing on, especially,
00:37:48.740you know, any Republican support that's out there to show that there is a way forward that
00:37:54.880everybody can get behind. But the price level, as you pointed out, is really important.
00:37:59.400A lot of companies, including some of the oil majors, have internal or shadow carbon pricing that they've been building into their business model for a long time that anticipates government action at some point, and it forces them to make investments that would be profitable under, you know, whatever kind of climate policy that might be put into effect.
00:38:26.920So that's sort of smart planning on their part. But from the communications perspective, I think what they're in part reacting to is the suite of lawsuits that cities and states have brought against companies like Exxon under the Exxon New campaign that our friends at 350 have done a great job raising awareness around.
00:38:51.980that decades ago, oil company scientists knew that climate change was happening, that fossil
00:38:59.740fuels were the primary driver and what the consequences would be. And these companies
00:39:05.600just buried that information and went on the attack against climate policy. The New York
00:39:11.800Times has a great feature on this, I want to say a month and a half ago, that shows that window in
00:39:18.740the 70s and 80s when we might have taken the kind of action that would prevent the runaway effects
00:39:24.800we're seeing now and um it documents how how that process happened where they figured out
00:39:31.000oh goodness like we're going to be held accountable for this we will do what the
00:39:36.380tobacco industry did which is discredit the science bury bury what we know and try to
00:39:42.780undermine what others are figuring out to keep ourselves making profit from what we sell instead
00:39:48.540of transforming. And the other thing too, to know about the, the Exxon backed carbon tax proposal
00:39:55.000is that the, the main vehicle is, is really sound and would really actually drive emissions down.
00:40:04.120But the kind of poison pill that some people are, uh, say, you know, not over my dead body
00:40:11.120is that it would protect them from tort liability. It would indemnify these, um,
00:40:17.380these fossil fuel companies from those same lawsuits that are increasingly being brought
00:40:22.400against them from public governments that are paying for the mess that that they made
00:40:28.980and saying look this can't all fall to our public coffers and taxpayers it you have to pony up
00:40:38.480because you knew this and you did it anyways and now you're fighting to prevent laws that would
00:40:43.580make sure we're free of this fossil fuel dependence. And so with a proposal that taxes
00:40:50.600carbon at a decent rate, but it does so in exchange for protection from being held accountable in the
00:40:59.000courts, I think that they're trying to split our movement. And it's up to us to, I think,
00:41:06.500stand strong, both in support of the carbon price that would bring down emissions at the level that
00:41:11.960we need and for the judicial system to work in the way that it must. And the last thing I'll say
00:41:19.600on that actually is that I think we have to keep in mind that all fossil fuel companies are not
00:41:24.720made equal and they don't sell the same product. And so the companies selling natural gas, for
00:41:32.580instance, know that they will remain in business longer than coal, which has a higher carbon
00:41:42.500dioxide footprint for the same amount of energy generated.
00:41:47.040And so you'll have oil and gas companies planning in advance that they'll be able to sell
00:41:54.400natural gas and keep fracking and keep building pipelines longer than coal companies, which
00:42:01.140Should we be put out of business first at lower rates of a carbon price?
00:42:06.080And so that's something to keep in mind that it's not a monolithic kind of community even there.
00:42:13.920Yeah, it's really important to be able to break down fossil fuel industry into these different categories
00:42:20.760because they all are different and their timelines are different.
00:42:26.480And all the things that you've said, I think, are really something for us all who are listening to sit with for a while.
00:42:32.680And I think one of the things that I was thinking about from earlier in the conversation was talking about how carbon pricing could also incentivize inventors to introduce low-carbon products as a means for producers to maintain profits.
00:42:50.700Of course, you know, these inventions could also be beneficial because like you were saying, a lot of the cars and other products we use regarding fossil fuels aren't efficient at all.
00:43:02.440So in one way, I see there being a benefit to it.
00:43:05.860And the other way, I'm concerned that this focus on carbon pricing is not directly asking us to reassess our energy consumption.
00:43:13.080And if we don't assess our consumption, it's quite possible that we will create a, quote, green economy that is still ecologically harmful because the production of so-called energy like hydropower and wind and solar power, when done at mass scale, can be absolutely detrimental in terms of land degradation, habitat loss, water use, community autonomy, you know, and the manufacturing of hazardous materials like in solar panels.
00:43:40.880so I would just love to hear your thoughts on this complexity because and like I said you know
00:43:46.820on one hand I don't think that we're going to suddenly stop using energy I think most of us
00:43:51.960are absolutely addicted to modernity in that way but then I also see this challenge that
00:44:00.020green energy is not the solution to stopping modern day slavery or environmental destruction
00:44:07.920yeah that's a great point and i think one that that many of us miss and it's the reason why
00:44:14.580there's still a difference between movements for conservation for clean energy for climate
00:44:23.580justice like there are distinctions um and where i come down is in support first and foremost of
00:44:33.800of energy efficiency of, of conserving energy. And that's, that's why, you know, having a really
00:44:39.860strong price on carbon pollution is so compelling to me because it would basically force us to,
00:44:50.500to not waste. And unfortunately we as a whole need to have our wallets tell us not to waste
00:45:01.800because every other cultural cue we're getting is to consume and so that said a really strong
00:45:11.800policy that would drive the levels of of conservation that we need and therefore
00:45:18.640not require that we cover every available you know remaining square foot of of wildland with
00:45:27.920solar panels or dig up the rest for cobalt or build enormous steel industrial products to get
00:45:37.660us the clean energy we need. Well, if we're not going to do that, then we really do have to change
00:45:42.720how much energy we're using overall. So it's not a one for one substitution, which what I said
00:45:48.180before already, that's not even feasible. So to do that, we have to have the cultural
00:45:55.960commitment to live differently because without that you don't have a movement strong enough
00:46:05.560to pass the laws that we need and then those laws even if they were passed let's say by fiat
00:46:12.420they couldn't be sustained because the people would elect new politicians to overturn them
00:46:19.540in a heartbeat. So the cultural change and the, you know, political economic change that we need
00:46:27.280cannot be separated. They're really one in the same. And that's where as much as solving the
00:46:35.480climate crisis is not an individual, you know, an individualistic project, there is a need and
00:46:43.860an opportunity for each one of us to contemplate what what would our lives look like if we were to
00:46:52.620use less and to have I think a positive orientation around that considering that
00:47:00.540so much of the waste and excess and the pollution from it that's killing us is for a lifestyle and
00:47:10.520livelihoods that don't make us happy a lot of the time. I think any of us, like myself at least,
00:47:19.540who live and work in a city and we're so glad to have time in the country and to have time
00:47:27.560to hike and turn off our phones and learn what the name of this berry that we're picking is and
00:47:36.840have a moment with friends that's unmediated by screens and you know it's easy to romanticize the
00:47:44.220kind of simple life but I think there's something really enduring in that and I'm looking at a
00:47:49.140Wendell Berry book right now like why do his words continue to resonate why do we have things like
00:47:56.240cabin porn where we just want to flip through you know internet pages of little secluded cabins in
00:48:01.780the middle of the woods, there's something so innate and that we're so hungry for to simplify
00:48:10.000our lives, have less noise, have less stuff, have less chaos that comes from this hyper
00:48:18.980consumeristic, hyper busy and important, you know, capital B, capital I lives that were
00:48:26.580sold in this country, often because we don't have an alternative.
00:48:30.460I mean just look at when there's a power outage how many of us have some of our favorite childhood memories with our families or with our friends when there wasn't power and we lit some candles and like told each other stories and saw each other differently and had to you know we experienced both the kind of thrill of dependence on nature and some of the fear as well that we don't really know how to live without.
00:49:00.460the technologies and sort of magical superpowers that we've developed through fossil fuels,
00:49:06.160there's so much reality there that if we can embrace in an excited vision, instead of, you
00:49:14.720know, buying the fear mongering, that the fossil fuel industry very much perpetuates some of the
00:49:20.980ads that they've run very effectively in places like California against cap and trade bills,
00:49:27.820for instance, has been of, you know, little grandmothers shivering in their homes with a
00:49:33.820threadbare blanket because the nasty environmentalists turned off, you know, her heat source.
00:49:41.220And that's evil, right? Like that's saying, you know, we're the ones who don't have a social
00:49:50.520heart and want to put people out of their homes and out of their comforts when in fact we know
00:49:57.120there's ways to live well in fact the ways to live best are ones where we're we're free of this
00:50:04.240polluting addiction um so that's where that's my response to the the you know debate I think
00:50:12.240between conservation and the kind of clean energy hype thank you for that response I really
00:50:19.040appreciated the the beauty and the passion which you spoke from and and I think it's really
00:50:25.420important for us to see the multiple sides that really need to be seen because it isn't a
00:50:35.600one-stop shop solution answer. It's complex. We've got ourselves in a real pickle as humanity right
00:50:42.920now. And I really loved hearing your thought process on that. And another thing that I was
00:50:52.060wanting to ask you about is you've previously said that you base a lot of your work focusing
00:50:57.140on legislature because theoretically it should be easier to convince a couple dozen decision
00:51:03.720makers versus millions of voters but doesn't this require that we vote in leaders and decision
00:51:11.180makers who are going to support these measures and then i think about how environmentalists
00:51:15.860don't have a great track record when it comes to voting the environmental voter project found that
00:51:20.700only 50% of environmentalists voted in this 2016 presidential election, compared to 69%
00:51:29.100among all registered voters. And low turnout poses long-term problems. Not only does it affect the
00:51:35.900outcome of close elections, but when people don't vote, they are not considered likely voters,
00:51:42.040which means they don't get called by pollsters. So how much of your work is mobilizing people to
00:51:47.940get out and vote and recentering conversations around environmental concern? Those are very
00:51:54.060important stats to get out there. And I think very shocking. I think many of us wouldn't expect that.
00:52:00.060But it's true that with something that we take for granted, you know, the earth and the ability
00:52:09.020to breathe and drink water um and get food we haven't been defending those basic needs and
00:52:18.700and rights because we think that they're just going to be around and instead the um you know
00:52:25.080fossil fuel and other polluting industries have have lobbyists in the halls of power every single
00:52:30.160day. I mean, day in, day out, they're there in droves. And so the basic upkeep of a democracy
00:52:40.800that represents, you know, all of our values, not just corporate, is it only begins with voting.
00:52:49.060I think all of the work that I do is in service of a robust democracy. And often the attention
00:52:59.660really peaks around, uh, around election times, but the work between elections is
00:53:06.840just as important because, um, then you have voters who are educated and mobilized and
00:53:14.460mobilizing their communities and really understanding what it is, it even means to
00:53:19.440be part of a, of a body politic of, at the community level. So, so I'd say all of it,
00:53:25.420all of it is about that project of putting people into positions of power that represent
00:53:33.220the values of sustainability and of justice that I work for. I think that there are organizations
00:53:42.400worth investing in and checking out to stay involved over the long term. In this last
00:53:49.760election cycle, groups like Swing Left and Indivisible and even the larger, you know,
00:53:56.400well-established groups, League of Conservation Voters all the way down, did a pretty good job
00:54:02.460of mobilizing people. Next Gen America really killed it with getting young people especially
00:54:08.900to turn out and vote. And that's a very high area of overlap with young people and people of color
00:54:16.980have very high levels of concern on climate change in a way that other voting constituencies
00:54:25.420might care, but it's sort of a second, third, maybe 15th tier issue. And so the need to
00:54:36.100enfranchise young voters and voters of color who have been very systemically blocked from
00:54:44.520Exercising their basic democratic rights, if we look at the gutting of the Voting Rights Act, if we look at the incredibly egregious, corrupt behavior in places like Georgia, you know, closing a whole suite of polling locations, purging hundreds of thousands of voters off the rolls.
00:55:05.240That's all kind of not to demonize anyone, but there's a very high overlap on that side of systems of white supremacy, of doing the corporate bidding and often of, yeah, pretty extreme right wing values that have kind of come up through years of planning that the left has not done.
00:55:32.500to consider how to create structural change that prevents the majority from exercising its will.
00:55:43.800And we know that the majority of Americans do want environmental protection.
00:55:48.940And even the majority of Trump voters are polled at quite high levels of concern on climate change
00:55:56.480and even willingness to pay for action and that's not what what I think we often think of so we know
00:56:06.860there's a big disconnect between what's going on for all of us in the electorate and then who
00:56:13.160makes it to these positions of power um so you know if there's a simple takeaway from all of that
00:56:19.580I'd say, yes, we need to mobilize our friends and networks to vote, but we also need to all become engaged politically on a regular basis.
00:56:33.440And the best way to do that is to find an organization that you like, get on their mailing list. Make sure that you're keeping up to date with opportunities to take action, whether that's calling lawmakers before important votes or attending rallies or lobby meetings or community meetings.
00:56:57.780You can do that no matter where you live. And in fact, the further you are maybe from an urban center, the more power you might have in a system where often, you know, less populated areas hold, for instance, more power in the Senate.
00:57:15.540And you as one rural voice can have a lot more access to your lawmakers than one person in a crowded city. So we really do all need to, I think, more than double down on our civic engagement in all of its forms.
00:57:35.960Thank you so much, Camila, for this incredible conversation that was so dense, so much information. I know I'm going to have to listen a few times and really study this topic. And I'm really fascinated by it and very grateful for you. And thank you so much for being on the show.
00:57:56.100Thank you so much for having me and good luck to us all.
00:57:59.560thanks for listening to for the wild podcast i'm producer and editor andrew stores the music you
00:58:09.540heard today was provided by sk kakaraba our podcast team includes our founder and host ayana
00:58:17.420young writer and producer francesca glassbell communications director aaron wise music
00:58:26.200coordinator, Carter Lou McElroy, and our co-managing directors, Melanie Younger and Mara Joy.
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