Recently though, our State Governments have discussed instigating a carbon trading scheme - the details are still to be decided - and that's an encouraging sign.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
The cap-and-trade plan is more market driven than anything else. If you want to discourage carbon use, you have to make it more expensive, but what is crucial is that this be a worldwide program that includes China and India.
Many scientists and economists also say putting a price on carbon through carbon taxes and/or cap-and-trade is necessary.
Countries have made impressive pledges to cut carbon pollution, but we have to ensure these promises become actions.
The key players are now all in place in Washington and in state governments across America to officially label carbon dioxide as a pollutant and enact laws that tax us citizens for our carbon footprints.
The fact that companies are getting into building power plants that collect their own CO2 on-site shows there's some leadership in that industry. Some industries have seen the writing on the wall: that carbon will have to be managed.
Many have criticized a federal carbon tax, saying that it would increase energy costs. Some continue to oppose it even when that revenue would be used to reduce other taxes in what's known as a tax swap.
I believe that nuclear needs to be a part of the solution if the U.S. really wants to be aggressive about reducing carbon.
A majority of American citizens are now becoming skeptical of the claim that our carbon footprints, resulting from our use of fossil fuels, are going to lead to climatic calamities. But governments are not yet listening to the citizens.
I am convinced that policies meant to reduce alleged carbon dioxide-induced global warming will be destructive.
Many retailers have complained bitterly to me about the complexity of the Carbon Reduction Commitment. It's not a commitment; it's a tax.