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Fossil fuel giants ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, BP, Goldman Sachs, Ford and GM are for it.

Progressive nonprofits are on the opposing side: Greenpeace, Food & Water Watch, Sunrise Movement, Friends of the Earth, Indigenous Environmental Network, Climate Justice Alliance and Life of the Land.

In the middle are mainstream environmental groups who must choose sides: should fossil fuels be taxed or banned?

The fossil fuel industry is pushing the tax approach. Let us use up our trillions of dollars of untapped petroleum, and in exchange, we will pass on higher rates to consumers.

Justice advocates note that economically challenged minority communities always seem to get all the undesirable infrastructure.

Instead of allowing these intrusive systems to remain in exchange for a monetary payment, they should be banned. We need to stop our addiction to oil.

The government likes taxes. They tax everything: taxes on cigarettes, alcohol, property and personal income raise money for the government to enable the funding of programs. Taxes on fossil fuel would provide another revenue stream for politicians to play with.

Extreme Weather

The COVID-19 pandemic is minor compared to the unfolding climate nightmare. A small increase in global temperature due to greenhouse gas emissions has triggered extreme weather events including intense hurricanes, rain bombs and flooding, and has led to massive coastal erosion.

Human misery is on the rise. Health impacts will overload the medical industry. Billions of climate migrants will cross borders seeking new homes. This can only be slowed down by banning the underlying culprit.

COVID-19 is minor compared to the climate nightmare.

Carbon taxes are all the rage today. They are the miracle golden key that will save us. But will they, or will a carbon tax just provide green money for politicians and greenwashing for corporations?

To date, global carbon emissions have generally been extremely low. A few countries have higher carbon taxes and that has led to unintended harm. The carbon tax has decreased fossil fuel use and replaced it with tree-based energy which emits high levels of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

Due to the power and influence of the fossil fuel industry, tree-burning is considered carbon neutral. Burn something, ignore all emissions associated with the forest razing industry, and clear-cutting forests has become the new coal.

It’s dirtier, more polluting, yet politically defined to be carbon neutral, so the fossil fuel industry wants to burn down forests to save the planet.

Obviously one can’t have both. Greenhouse gas emissions, whether from fossil fuel or tree-burning must be halted. Fossil fuels must be eliminated as fast as possible.