Use free market against CO2

Thirty years ago, a Senate committee heard testimony from NASA’s Dr. James Hansen that Earth’s climate was changing at an unnatural rate due to the growing concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere.

Since 1988, scientists have continued their dispassionate collection and analysis of hard climate data, confirming that unnaturally accelerated global warming is happening and is caused by man’s fossil fuel use. Congress hasn’t been able to agree on climate change legislation and the nation has continued on a “business as usual” use of fossil fuel - with resulting measurable effects.

Climate change legislation is a national issue and as the Washington Policy Center here has shown, it isn’t economically efficient for individual states to tackle. The Washington Policy Center and the 2016 Republican platform have stated, environmental (or climate change) problems are best solved by giving incentives for individual ingenuity. That’s why the Washington Policy Center and local Republican Party organizations should be supporting Carbon Fee and Dividend legislation.

Here in the 5th Congressional District, our representative needs to hear support for Carbon Fee and Dividend from these organizations. Representative McMorris Rodgers can be a leader in employing free-market measures to limit fossil fuel use.

Bruce Bailey

Colville