The way we’ve solved previous pollution problems like acid rain was we said: ‘We’re gonna charge you if you’re releasing this stuff into the atmosphere. We’re gonna let you figure it out, but we’re gonna to tell you that you can’t keep dumping it out in the atmosphere and making everybody else pay for it.’ So if there is one thing I would like to see, it’d be for us to be able to price the cost of carbon emissions.

Some members of my political party worry that pricing carbon is a ‘big government’ intervention. In fact, it will reduce the role of government, which, on our present course, increasingly will be called on to help communities and regions affected by climate-related disasters like floods, drought-related crop failures and extreme weather like tornadoes, hurricanes and other violent storms. We’ll all be paying those costs. Not once, but many times over.

The most direct policy solution to the climate crisis is a carbon tax, offset by reductions in taxes on wages.

Americans like to compete on a level playing field. All the players should have an equal opportunity to win based on their competitive merits, not on some artificial imbalance that gives someone or some group a special advantage. We think this idea should be applied to energy producers. They all should bear the full costs of the use of the energy they provide. ..

…Most of these costs are included in what it takes to produce the energy in the first place, but they vary greatly in the price imposed on society by the pollution they emit and its impact on human health and well-being, the air we breathe and the climate we create. We should identify these costs and see that they are attributed to the form of energy that causes them.

You gotta tax something to fund the government – why not make it pollution rather than income, something we want more of as oppose to something we want less of? What if we did that by eliminating all subsidies for all fuels and attaching all costs to all fuels, following the free-enterprise principle of accountability? Then, what we’d see is the free enterprise system delivering the fuels of the future.

From where I sit, having spent 15 years on Wall Street and 20 years running my own company, the certainty of a pollution fee — coupled with a tax cut for all Americans — is a much better deal. It would be better for the economy, better for taxpayers and — given the experiences so far in Europe — it would be better for the environment. I think it’s time we stopped listening to the skeptics who say, ‘But for the politics’ and start being honest about costs and benefits.

Almost every idea that might bring us a better future would be made much easier if the cost of fossil fuel was higher—if there was some kind of a tax on carbon emissions that made the price of coal and oil and gas reflect its true environmental cost. Then everything from solar panels to windmills to safe nuclear reactors (if they can be built) would spread much more easily.

We need to craft national policy that uses market forces to provide incentives for the technological advances required to address climate change. As I’ve said, we can do this by placing a tax on carbon dioxide emissions. Many respected economists, of all ideological persuasions, support this approach. We can debate the appropriate pricing and policy design and how to use the money generated. But a price on carbon would change the behavior of both individuals and businesses.

A price on emissions that cause harm is essential. Yes, a carbon tax. Carbon tax with 100 percent dividend is needed to wean us off fossil fuel addiction. Tax and dividend allows the marketplace, not politicians, to make investment decisions.

A tax on carbon emissions will unleash a wave of innovation to develop technologies, lower the costs of clean energy and create jobs as we and other nations develop new energy products and infrastructure. This would strengthen national security by reducing the world’s dependence on governments like Russia and Iran. Climate change is the challenge of our time. Each of us must recognize that the risks are personal. We’ve seen and felt the costs of underestimating the financial bubble. Let’s not ignore the climate bubble.

I believe U.S. public policy on global climate change should encourage a transition to a lower-carbon-intensive economy through a broad-based, mandatory approach. And, I believe the best approach is a carbon tax.

We need revenue to balance the budget. We need sustainable clean-tech jobs. We need less dependence on Mideast oil. And we need to take steps to mitigate climate change — just in case Governor Perry is wrong. The easiest way to do all of this at once is with a gasoline tax or price on carbon.

The solution can be a fundamentally conservative one that will empower the marketplace to find the most efficient response. We can do this by putting a price on emissions of carbon dioxide — a carbon tax. Few in the United States now pay to emit this potent greenhouse gas into the atmosphere we all share. Putting a price on emissions will create incentives to develop new, cleaner energy technologies.

A carbon tax/fee is the key to controlling climate change.

Once you tax carbon, you make it cheaper to produce clean energy.

A well-crafted carbon tax would do three things: First, it would provide incentives for conservation for everyone. Second, it would promote higher utilization of today’s power plants that are low emitters of carbon and encourage low-carbon fuel choices for the future. And third, it would encourage the development of new technologies.

It is rare that a business lends its support to new taxes. But in this case, given the risk-management challenges we face and the alternatives under consideration, it is my judgment that a carbon tax is the best course of public policy action.