A modest carbon tax, had such a deal been struck in 1989, would have mattered a lot. It would have rejiggered a million spreadsheets, nudging the ocean liner that is our economy onto a new compass reading not too far off our heading -- but one that, over the years, would have steered us into relatively safe waters. And even at this late date there's no intellectual argument against putting a price on carbon -- most economists are for it. All things equal, it is a good idea. But there's also no way that such an approach alone can do the trick: were we to rely on carbon taxes to cut emissions at the rate required now, they would need to be so high that no political system could sustain them. (The I.P.C.C. study said that, at the high end, carbon taxes might need to reach five thousand five hundred dollars a ton to squeeze the last drops of fossil fuel out of the economy.)
The oil companies can live with a modest tax because it's a way to extend their basic business model for a couple more decades, which is, perhaps, the best they can muster in a world in which engineers are cutting the cost of a solar panel by a percent or two every month. And, for the companies, it's infinitely preferable to the Green New Deal -- not to mention the growing pack of lawsuits from cities large and small, demanding cash to build sea walls; New York City's plan to divest its pension funds from fossil-fuel companies; and thousands of protesters in kayaks mobbing their rigs as they try to set off to drill in the Arctic.
It would also have appeal for the many politicians who care at least a little about climate change and who have despaired of a deal ever emerging. Their response is likely to be: don't make the perfect the enemy of the good; you have to start somewhere. The problem is that the ultimate negotiation is being carried out with science, which adamantly rejects compromise. It doesn't even really negotiate. It's not interested in who gave what contribution to whom: it just takes the carbon we produce and makes the oceans ever more acidic. To answer that, at this point, means, in policy terms, a Second World War-scale mobilization to deploy renewable energy and a commitment to stop new exploration and development of fossil fuels. It means an explicit acknowledgment that their age is over, and that the transition to clean energy is our top priority.
Political reality is always important, but in this case there's something more crucial -- call it just plain reality. It dictates that every step we take from here on -- pay heed to the underlying science, above all to the shrinking time we have left to make any real difference. After 30 years of standing still, baby steps won't do us a bit of good, and a misstep may cost us our last chance.
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