Column: Who Should Pay for Climate Solutions? The Debate is Heating Up

Source: Los Angeles Times  |  By Sammy Roth

Confronting the climate crisis won’t be cheap. California is trying to figure out who will pay. Under a series of proposals being considered by Gov. Gavin Newsom’s appointees to the Public Utilities Commission, the wealthy would be forced to cough up, in the form of flat fees on their monthly electric bills. But so would middle-class families. The debate has raised difficult questions of socioeconomic justice and climate progress — and prompted a group of Democratic lawmakers to try to repeal a monthly fee requirement they approved less than two years ago.

“We’re not interested in seeing anybody’s bill goes up. But it’s a zero-sum game,” said Matthew Freedman, an attorney at the Utility Reform Network, a consumer watchdog group. “Somebody is going to pay more, and somebody is going to pay less. That’s just how it works.”