auction

Court of Appeal Confirms California Cap-and-Trade is Not a Tax

It’s voluntary and it provides valuable commodities to purchasers

With the feds backsliding (or worse) on climate regulation, the efforts of California and other states to tackle climate change are especially prominent and critical. So it’s a welcome time for today’s good news for California climate regulators: The state court of appeal has rejected industry’s challenge to California’s cap-and-trade program.  That program is one …

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The Cap-and-Trade Auction: Still Not a Tax

Folks are talking again about whether California’s climate cap-and-trade auction is an unlawful tax, rather than a valid exercise of the state’s regulatory power to control pollution.  The news hook for the revival of this conversation is a recent order, discussed below, from the California Court of Appeal to the parties in the court case where …

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California cap and trade survives industry tax challenge

Auctions can proceed in one of the state’s signature climate change programs

ARB’s winning streak in climate cases continues.  A California superior court has rejected a prominent set of industry challenges to the state’s cap-and-trade program, upholding a significant element of California’s suite of programs to comply with AB 32 and to reduce the state’s greenhouse gas emissions back to 1990 levels by 2020. (Opinion here.)  The cases were filed by the …

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Cap-and-Trade: Why Auctions are Better than Give-Aways

Earlier this week California began auctioning off greenhouse gas emissions allowances, and the sky has not fallen.  But is an auction really the best way to distribute the allowances?  The California Chamber of Commerce says no.  Its lawsuit—discussed in recent posts by Ann, Rhead, and Sean—doesn’t challenge the State’s authority to limit greenhouse gas emissions, …

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Breaking News: California Chamber of Commerce Sues over AB 32 Auction

The California Chamber of Commerce has launched the first industry lawsuit against the auction portion of California’s cap-and-trade program on the basis that auctioning off allowances constitutes an unauthorized, unconstitutional tax.  The complaint was filed today in Sacramento Superior Court and seeks to stop the auction and have the auction regulations declared invalid.  The Chamber argues …

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New Developments for Cap-and-Trade in California

There’s big news for California’s cap-and-trade program to control the state’s greenhouse gas emissions on two fronts this week.  Cara alluded to the first in her post this week about California Democrats gaining a supermajority in both houses of the legislature after Tuesday’s election.  The legislative development is important because  the state legislature can probably …

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