Aninidreams in Green

In our quest for searching for alternatives for fuel, one country, France, is in the midst of a proposing a plan that would tax those households that have large quantities of CO2 output.  The cost would be equivalent to around $20 USD per ton of CO2 output from utilizing personal cars, heating homes, and so on.

Is this really a feasible way to search for fuel alternatives? Increasing the common lay-person’s taxes does not in turn force your average citizen to seek other alternatives. Global organizations, fuel companies, scientists and engineers are searching for the next best alternative to oil and oil products, and we have some good ideas out there, but there is no enforcement. I think this is where France differs. While collecting more funds for national debt, they are also enforcing their citizens to be green…perhaps. The consumer could just decide to pay the tax and this doesn’t cause any greening to occur on the citizen’s part. It only says to its government, ok, here is your money and I’ll continue living how I’m used to.

I think this does several things for the people in France: raises taxes and for some that cannot afford to do so, brings in more money to pay off national debt (as mentioned in the article), and leaves the typical consumer with no choice but to pay the taxes if they cannot afford green housing or transportation.

The aforementioned reasons are why I am not fully agreeing with such a proposal. The search for fuel alternatives has to be something that is economically efficient and accessible to everyone.

For example, if I wanted to use the ZipCar transportation, I could not. There are not any in my area. If I wanted to take public transportation, I could not. It is few and far between in rural areas.  It was even difficult for me to do so in the suburbs of Richmond, VA to get into work downtown.  If I wanted to bus into work, the city expected you to drive to a parking lot to then pick up a bus that would take you the rest of the way downtown.

I do agree that enforcement is one of the minimum steps for making those who are unaware or just don’t care to become more energy-saving, green consumers. At a minimum, why couldn’t there be more personnel employed at dumping sites to insure bulky items such as older televisions, computers or recyclables such as large cardboards and foams are not discarded? I’ve been to several dumping sites, they don’t do much research into what your load contains and how could they anyway without going through your bags?

As an example, I use the energy-saving lightbulbs, but once you buy them and it comes time to dispose of them, you have to do a bit of online research to find out how to dispose of them. This information should be readily available, perhaps even listed on the package. For your information, if you follow the previous link, you can find that Home Depot stores have CFL recycling.

**So, does France have something here? What are your thoughts? Is this the first step in finding alternatives, and making citizens more responsibly green by doing so with legal enforcement and taxation?**

If this were to happen in the U.S., what would your carbon footprint be?  Mine turned out to be below the national average but still around 30 tons/year and this is with owning two 30-40mpg cars, utilizing energy-saving appliances, recycling, and eating organic foods half the time.

What is your CO2 or carbon footprint? Find out: here.