Portland -- city officials plan to charge hundreds of dollars for each new home that is not extremely energy-efficient in order to curb the growth of greenhouse gas emissions. In addition, it would require an energy efficiency report as part of every existing home sales.
The "carbon fee" would be levied upon builders who merely just comply with the energy efficiency requirements of the Oregon building code.
"Builders in Portland on Wednesday were already pushing back.
"There is no way the homebuilders will ever support a mandated program," said Jim McCauley, vice president of government affairs for the Homebuilders Association of Metropolitan Portland. "This has largely been a totally internal conversation with only select invited parties." "
The plan would also help maintain the city's reputation for "green living" and creates friendly competition between Chicago, Seattle, San Francisco, and Austin, Texas to try and "out green" each other.
"City Commissioner Dan Saltzman acknowledged that home builders may react strongly against it. To ease the industry into the fold, he said the plan would include a two-year period of city-funded technical support and education for builders."
Saltzman said that the idea for inspecting the energy efficiency of existing housing would be to disclose the information to home buyers, sellers, and the city.
The plan will go before Portland residents, in hearings, in January. With passage, the carbon-fee rules would be in place by 2010.
sounds to me like the only thing "green" about this proposal, is the tax revenue that it would generate.
3 comments:
It seems to me that this is the whole agenda behind the global warming agenda. This is the liberal answer to the war on terror.
Be afraid, be very, very, afraid. There is a carbon emitter under every bed and there must be a way to tax them to fund the one world bureaucracy. Also on the burner is the LOST treaty in which the UN will decide who can and can't use the oceans of the world and extract a tax to fund this. Next comes water and air.
Reminds me of the Beatles song-Taxman- If you take a drive I'll tax the street.
If you try to walk, I'll tax your feet.
Wonder if they will ever figure out that taxes (money) is not going to solve everything?
Tracking a person's carbon footprint might be a great way to decide who pays most....only problem is, it takes a lifetime to discover what ones carbon footprint is. I was happy to hear Warren Buffet say that it was time for the IRS to start taxing the rich instead of giving them breaks. I hope someone listens.
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