From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@yahoo.com)
Date: Mon Dec 02 2002 - 15:30:45 MST
--- spike66 <spike66@attbi.com> wrote:
> When the Kyoto Protocol was being debated I wondered
> about the fact that the US government does not have
> the authority to dictate how much CO2 is produced by
> its citizens. Furthermore there is nothing in the
> US constitution from which such authority could be
> derived. In their saner moments, every government
> on the globe must have realized that they too lacked
> the authority to dictate CO2 production. Why did they
> decide to play chicken with that proposal, and wait
> for the US to be the bad guy?
Actually, there is a legitimate basis for regulating CO2 emissions by
private citizens, since interstate commerce is a constitutionally valid
area of congressional regulation, and emitting any substance that is
determined to be a pollutant becomes a negative externality that
travels across state lines (via the atmosphere) and is therefore
theoretically a form of interstate commerce. The commercial problem of
externalities is getting a proper accounting and payment for them (both
positive and negative externalities.
The problem is of course determining that CO2 is in fact a pollutant.
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