Environmental Justice

The Los Angeles Times reports: "A San Francisco superior court judge has put California's sweeping plan to curb greenhouse gas pollution on hold, saying the state did not adequately evaluate alternatives to its cap and trade program." Specifically, "the judge noted, officials gave short shrift to analyzing a carbon fee, or carbon tax . . . to a market-based trading system in their December 2008 plan."

The California lawsuit, which was filed by environmental groups representing low-income communities, asserts that: "a cap-and-trade program would allow refineries, power plants and other big facilities in poor neighborhoods to avoid cutting emissions of both greenhouse gases and traditional air pollutants." (See http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/greenspace/2011/03/california-global-warming-program-put-on-hold.html.)

This dispute involves a conflict of ethical arguments. The argument supporting California's cap and trade plan is consequential. Imposing the plan on industrial facilities emitting greenhouse gases would reduce these emissions. The argument for environmental justice also involves consequential reasoning, as it points to the likely consequences of such a plan for low-income communities. But its main ethical assertion is about the government's duty to act with justice, because the rule of law requires that the rights of citizens be given equal protection.

In the Times article Bill Gallegos, executive director of Communities for a Better Environment, defends the court decision because: “It means that oil refineries, which emit enormous amounts of greenhouse gases and contribute to big health problems, cannot simply keep polluting by purchasing pollution credits, or doing out of state projects.”

The consequential argument for a cap and trade program rests on the prediction that overall there will be reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. The environmental justice argument affirms duties that must be fulfilled and rights that must be protected, and also weighs the overall estimate of greenhouse gas reduction against the likely deleterious consequences for low-income communities.

With hope . . . Bob Traer