CTV.ca | Carbon tax likely shelved for now: experts

OTTAWA -- Economic storm clouds and a lukewarm reception to the Liberals' Green Shift plan will likely shelve a national carbon tax for now, experts say.

Economists and environmental groups say it's unlikely future governments would adopt the policy. At least for awhile.

"I don't believe that it will completely die, but it's tough to see it being advanced by the Conservatives after they campaigned so stridently against it," Doug Porter, an economist with BMO Capital Markets, said in an email.

"I suspect that given the current financial market turmoil, the likelihood of at least a moderate North American recession, and the unpopularity of the B.C. carbon tax, that a national carbon tax will be put aside for some time."
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"Eventually, we're going to have it," said Stephen Hazell, executive director of the Sierra Club.

"Unless some miracle happens and global warming just disappears -- which is highly unlikely -- we're going to have to start pricing carbon.

Emission Trading Scheme - the next bubble in times of financial crisis

...A staterun ETS truly tops this development. At the end, someone will have to pay for the bubble: the real world industry. And they will have to pay twice: Not only for buying emission rights in the first place, but also to set up infrastructures and knowledge to deal with the ETS toy. In times where money is so urgently needed for industry investments, in order to keep the real economy running and alive, while financial markets are in crisis, the money for emission rights could be planned a lot better.
This is definitely not the time for another setback to competitiveness of the European Union‘s industrial backbone. Its stable functioning guarantees the available money to spend on social welfare, education and climate protection. It will certainly not work the other way round. And finally, it is absolutely not the time to create another bubble.

(Via Benny Peiser)