Washington Examiner: “Oil Gets Relief, Chevron Triple-Fracks, and Cassidy Reintroduces Carbon Tariff”
RFF Fellow Kevin Rennert comments on a border carbon adjustment bill introduced recently in the US Senate.
The impact: Preliminary modeling conducted by Washington, D.C., think tank Resources for the Future has found the proposed tariff could help shift U.S. imports to countries with lower carbon intensity manufacturing, while also increasing domestic production of the covered products.
“All of those taken together would reduce the emissions that are kind of embodied in US consumed products for those sectors,” RFF Federal Climate Policy director Kevin Rennert told Callie.
While environmentalists and left-leaning lawmakers have long called for a carbon border adjustment mechanism to reduce global emissions, Rennert said this proposal would not have a big effect on overall emissions.
“I think the focus from Senator Cassidy has always really been on leveling the playing field for US manufacturing,” Rennert said. “And the additional benefits that come along for reducing carbon intensity have been important, but not necessarily the primary goal of the legislation.”
