USA Today Backs Cap-and-Trade as Way to Tackle GHG Emissions

USA Today, in an editorial published Tuesday, endorsed cap-and-trade as the "best option to fight warming" Congress would be able to achieve. "The only sure way to move from traditional fuels to a greener mix anytime soon is to begin making it more expensive to continue on the current path and let the market work out the most effective way to do it."

The editorial said the "simplest solution" would be to tax fossil fuels even more, "however, that is a political non-starter, and any tax would inevitably become complex after Congress got done writing in exemptions and discounts for various groups. Further, a tax wouldn't set a hard limit on greenhouse gas emissions. That leaves the 'cap-and-trade' approach pending on Capitol Hill."

Admitting that there "are plenty of reasons to dislike cap-and-trade," the editorial then said that "if the threat of human-induced global warming is real, and the overwhelming weight of scientific evidence suggests that it is, this plan or something like it is probably the best tool the political system can produce to begin to counter it."