Things are going hot and heavy in our nation’s capitol. Laws are being quickly passed and then the details scribbled in just before they vote for them. Most of our elected officials never even read the bills. A new broom deal sweeps clean. Now, I take this economic situation serious – we don’t need a 1930s Depression, and how much they must do to ward it off is important.
But after attending two national meetings of rural electric directors this winter, I am concerned about this “carbon-tax” issue and want to tell all of you what I saw in that legislation that is coming up shortly in both the House and Senate.
It is a tax on the consumer – you at the end of the line. It will be paid at the meter on your house, barn or business. For the average homeowner it could be as high as $50 a month, and increase by the next decade. Larger users will pay more, of course, because your bill is based on costs of operation and kilowatt usage. We know electric costs are going up, it comes from higher fuel and inflation. While electricity has been a bargain, we all know that higher costing energy is going to make it rise at the same time. Many of you saw some raises this year on rural electricity because of higher fuel price inputs. But if this tax is put on power plants, then it's going to be added on to those escalating costs as well. Write your Congressman and U.S. Senators and tell them you don’t want to pay a carbon-tax.
I know everyone hates “carbon”. We all need to conserve energy. But this tax will be like a "pike pass" pass. Coal fired plant “A” will be allowed so much carbon emissions, then they will need to buy more permits to meet the government regulations if they are to keep producing electricity. These permits will be sold on Wall Street at auctions and power companies, stock brokers and all these guys like Madsen will buy them up and then sell them back to your electric generator at an inflated price. Your generator will have to buy them to make you electricity, and that cost will be handed down to you.
We are fast approaching the capacity of our national generations’ ability to keep the lights on. Rural electric users are 70 percent dependent on coal fired plants. We can’t change that. They are not spending this money on research to change. The administration won’t talk about nuclear power. The president omitted it completely from his energy speech. We have less than one percent wind generation today and we can’t build the needed ones in the next two decades. They are very delicate devices, and count the ones that don’t run when you drive by a big field of them – they still need backup when the wind quits.
This tax will not speed up clean coal energy development. This tax will not get you the power plants built we will need in less than a decade. You saw that mess in California a few years ago when accountants and the wheeler-dealers like Enron figured it out – they were going to get those folks cheap power, and there was none.
This tax won’t be voted on by a 60 percent majority. This tax will hurt the retiree, small farmer, low income family and small businessman. This tax is really what the administration has said will pay off the national debt they are piling up. No tax raises passed by Congress on income taxes, instead it will come in an envelope included in your power bill total amount.
They can talk any way they want about it, but if they pass this into law, you can bet you will have to make some tough decisions in your retirement years. Write your Representatives in Washington and say, “No" to the Carbon-Fuel Tax. Send them a postcard or an E-mail. If you aren’t on a rural coop meter you’ll still pay it on an IOU power bill as well.
Think about these things.
P.S. My latest western novel, “The Sundown Chaser” was on the shelves April 9. Visit www.ozarksfn.com to get the link to a video preview.
Western novelist Dusty Richards and his wife Pat live on Beaver Lake in northwest Arkansas. For more information about his books you can email Dusty by visiting www.ozarksfn.com and clicking on 'Contact Us' or call 1-866-532-1960.
