Yankee Institute, Connecticut’s liberty-loving think tank, has stopped a dubious green-energy scheme pushed by state Democrats.
Herewith, a deserved shout-out to the liberty-loving think tank, Yankee Institute for Public Policy, overseen by the indefatigable Carol Platt Liebbau, for its diligent David role in stopping the Goliath of TCI during the Connecticut legislature’s just-ended 2021 session. (Warning: The nefarious undertaking might raise its ugly head in a forthcoming legislative special session.)
TCI is shorthand for the Transportation and Climate Initiative, a regional compact — the brainchild of climate-change foes — that describes itself as 13 “Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states and the District of Columbia that seeks to improve transportation, develop the clean energy economy and reduce carbon emissions from the transportation sector.”
Translated for the everyday person, it’s a green-politics concoction, a “cap-and-trade” scheme that threatens to clobber exhaust pollution by cutting (millions of gallons of) available fuel for cars and trucks, and significantly hiking gasoline prices, by some measures up to 26 cents a gallon. To be paid by everyday persons – not a lot of whom like what they hear when they do hear about TCI.
Which many have, thanks to Yankee’s efforts. TCI was a priority for Democratic governor Ned Lamont, supported by the usual leftist organizations, who was adamant about getting authorization from the state’s Democrat-run legislature to partner up with adjoining Massachusetts and Rhode Island (and the not-so-adjoining District of Columbia) to commence the plan. But thanks to prolonged efforts by Yankee, which had the temerity to repeatedly warn the populace of TCI’s pocketbook wallop (earning the think tank direct and pointed attacks from a peeved Lamont), the legislature failed to give to give the governor the necessary authorization.
There was this, too: Per Marc Fitch, the Yankee Institute reporter who has delivered unrelenting analyses over the past year of TCI’s numerous downsides, Connecticut residents would have enjoyed the likelihood of the scheme draining the state’s Special Transportation Fund by $500 million (taxpayer dollars, lest we forget) over the next decade:
The Transportation and Climate Initiative, which would cap the amount of emissions Connecticut generates through gasoline and diesel sales, could underfund Connecticut’s struggling Special Transportation Fund by $500 million, according to numbers crunched by the Connecticut Energy Marketers Association and reviewed by the regional New England Convenience Store and Energy Marketers Association.
Under the TCI program, Connecticut’s transportation emissions will be capped and then lowered year over year, requiring gasoline wholesalers and distributors to purchase emission credits at auction, but, according to CEMA, the cap means less gasoline and diesel fuel available for purchase.
Maybe residents also got torqued when they discovered there was a ton of money to be made at the expense of their misery — or else, why would oil giant BP be lobbying for TCI? Fitch reports:
International oil giant BP has been lobbying for Connecticut’s General Assembly to pass the Transportation and Climate Initiative program to lower transportation emissions, but the company could end up profiting from the cap and trade system after acquiring the majority stake in the largest forest carbon offset developer in the country.
The TCI program is a cap and trade system that would require gasoline wholesalers and distributors to purchase emission credits at auction. The funds from the auction would be sent to participating states to invest in electric vehicles, public transportation and climate justice initiatives for cities.
However, the controversial program would result in gasoline and diesel price increases at the pump as fuel suppliers pass down the costs of the emission auctions to drivers and some organizations have warned the decreasing emissions cap could eventually result in fuel shortages and less revenue for Connecticut’s Special Transportation Fund.
Emission credits from the TCI auctions can be bought, sold and traded on a secondary market, but there also exists a market for carbon offsets under the TCI program and that market could allow a company like BP to generate profit from the emissions reduction program.
One man’s misery being another’s opportunity; the legislature’s upcoming special session means all is not lost for the system-gamers, Lamont, and a legion of lefty environmental groups, who collectively yearn to pull off the TCI agreement.
But they’ll have to go through Yankee to get it. Place your bets.