Episode 5: What is a Carbon Fee or Carbon Tax?

This episode is a deep dive into Alaska’s transition to renewable energy. We explore innovations taking place in rural Alaska and opportunities for renewable energy along the railbelt. We hear about the future of financing renewables in Alaska through an innovative proposition called a “green bank.” And in the middle of all this, we hear from one of Alaska’s renewable energy stars –  Kodiak Electric Association. Guests: Chris Rose (Renewable Energy Alaska Project) and Darron Scott (Kodiak Electric Association). 

A carbon fee or carbon tax offers an approach to carbon pricing that is represented in multiple bills in Congress. This episode features the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act including mechanisms to address the cost of a carbon fee on households as well as tools to make U.S. products competitive  and jobs secure. Guests: Tony Sirna (Citizen's Climate Lobby) and Adele Morris (Brookings Institution). 

This episode explores the cap and trade model with a focus on the 10-year old California program and the brand new Washington State program set to go into effect in 2023. Special attention is focused on lessons learned about carbon offsets as a component to cap and trade systems. Guests: Tony Sirna (Citizen's Climate Lobby) and Kevin Tempest (Low Carbon Prosperity Institute). 

In this episode we explore what it means to put a price on carbon emissions as a tool to wring fossil fuels  out of the economy and accelerate the emerging transition to renewable energy. Guest economists describe the two methods for pricing carbon emissions: cap and trade systems and a carbon fee or carbon tax approach. They demystify terms used in the policy arena: What are externalities? What’s a market signal? Carbon offset? Emissions allowance? Border carbon adjustment? How can policy-makers address the social cost of carbon emissions to vulnerable communities, or the cost of a carbon price on households? Guests: Marc Hafstead (Resources for the Future), Yoram Bauman (Stand-Up Economist).

As carbon is building up in the atmosphere, the ocean is absorbing and storing much more heat from the atmosphere than it used to.  This episode explores how ocean warming is transforming Alaska’s oceans before our very eyes and shares strong advice from the global scientific community to dramatically reduce carbon emissions, starting now, to prevent the most significant consequences. We discuss what scientists call a “tipping point” in the climate system – a large event that leads to sudden changes, beyond which there is no coming back. Guests: Francis Wiese, Stantec

Exploring Ocean Acidification and the Connection Between Acidification, Ocean Warming, and Harmful Algal Blooms Marine scientists engaged in ocean acidification research and monitoring harmful algal blooms talk about what they are studying in Alaska. We explore the critical intersection between these issues and ocean warming, and the potential for multi-stressors to alter the ecosystem and the resources we rely on in coastal Alaska. Guests: Jessica Cross (NOAA PMEL), Kris Holderied (NOAA Kasitsna Bay Lab), Jamie Goen (Alaska Bering Sea Crabbers).