The founding members of a new bipartisan Senate climate caucus say they are aiming to avoid focusing just on a carbon price to maintain equal support in both parties.
“If we come out the gate having that as our centerpiece, it may not behoove what we ought to do” on climate change, said Republican Sen. Mike Braun of Indiana, one of the co-leaders of the new group.
Carbon pricing is an option for discussion, “maybe to compare against regulation,” Braun told reporters on a phone call Wednesday. But he added that having a carbon price as the focus would likely lead to “less discussion that would probably not put is in the right direction.”
Braun’s Democratic partner on the new caucus — Delaware Sen. Chris Coons — introduced in 2018 one of the first bipartisan carbon tax bills in Congress in nearly a decade. Coons unveiled that bill with then-retiring Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake.
In July, Coons introduced a new carbon pricing bill with Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California.
Coons told reporters he is hoping a carbon pricing “will be on the agenda for the caucus to discuss,” but he also said he recognized a carbon tax “is a controversial idea politically.”
Coons and Braun both said they want the new caucus, the first such bipartisan group in the Senate, to be a forum for senators to find common ground on climate policy.
They want the caucus to have equal members from both parties, avoiding a situation like the one the House Climate Solutions Caucus now finds itself in, with more Democratic members than Republicans.
Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairwoman Lisa Murkowski of Alaska has already confirmed her membership in the new caucus. More members will be announced in the coming days, Braun said.
Coons said the qualifications for caucus membership are: “Do be constructive, don’t be obnoxious.” Members must agree that climate change is happening, that human-caused emissions have an effect, and that the United States should take action, he added.
And the senators are also expecting any colleagues who join to be open to all types of solutions — including technologies like advanced nuclear energy and carbon capture and storage, which have drawn criticism from some Democrats on the party’s left-wing.
“I recognize there is controversy about the future of coal and nuclear, but I think when you take a step back,” constraining global emissions means policymakers “have got to be willing to take a look at those technologies,” Coons said.
