The emissions law builds on a 2006 measure that gave California the nation’s most ambitious program of countering climate change by limiting discharges from cars and industry, and by requiring businesses to purchase pollution credits via auction.
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SB32 calls for the state to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030.
The vote came hours after the state Assembly passed their measure by a count of 44-to-28.
This would put California’s climate laws on a par with the European Union, which is widely considered an industrialised world leader in terms of its ambition to combat climate change.
“Today’s concurrence vote is another example of how broad support is for civil asset forfeiture reform, with overwhelming majorities in both houses and public opinion over 75%”, said Lynne Lyman, state director of the Drug Policy Alliance.
A bill that would allow terminally ill people to obtain experimental drugs appears headed to Governor Brown’s desk for the second year in a row. Now, the new bill is meant to focus on improving California’s infrastructure.
The advocacy group Health Access California says many consumers don’t know that their health plan has been designated as unreasonably expensive.
Unless a proposed extension of the cap-and-trade program beyond 2020 is supported by two-thirds of lawmakers, polluters are expected to argue in court that it violates a California law passed by voters in 2010 dealing with new taxes and fees.
S.B. 32, however, also required the passage of Assembly Bill 197 – companion legislation to establish new standards and authority for the California Air Resources Board to enforce limits.
That said, once climate proceeds are in the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF), spending them wisely to reduce emissions and benefit communities, especially disadvantaged communities, is a metric of program success.
As California’s future climate policy takes center stage in the Legislature, there needs to be more focus on creating a business environment that will promote quality, middle-income jobs.
Still, in light Tuesday’s Assembly vote, Gov.
“The California cap-and-trade program is first and foremost a greenhouse gas reduction program, and it is working” to bring down carbon pollution from fossil fuels, Clegern said in an email.
The state on Tuesday said it failed to sell any permits offered to cover carbon emissions in 2016 and sold just 660,560 of the 10 million permits it offered to cover emissions in 2019, at the auction floor price of $12.73 a tonne.
California’s program is struggling this year against litigation by the state’s chamber of commerce and opposition in the state Legislature. Even if the state prevails in its argument that cap and trade is not a tax, extending the program without a supermajority could draw another suit under the 2010 initiative Proposition 26, which applied Proposition 13’s provisions to fees as well as taxes.
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“California’s charting a clear path on climate beyond 2020”, Brown said in a statement after the vote, adding, “I look forward to signing this bill”.
