Tax on carbon emissions would raise funds for renewable projects, energy audits.

• Author: Cote, Mike
• Position: ENVIRONMENT - Brief article

An activist group aims to raise $180 million a year in Colorado for renewable-energy and energy-efficiency projects by charging homeowners and businesses a fee on carbon dioxide emissions.

Clean Energy Progress wants to put a proposal before voters in November to charge households with average energy use about $2.50 more a month, based on a roughly 3 percent tax on natural gas and electricity.

"Our motivation is global climate change and the environment. However, the real benefit to the state is the economy," said Tom McKinnon, a Colorado School of Mines professor and a member of the group's steering committee. "We're facing a recession. A big chunk of the recession is due to high energy costs."

Some of the money would be used to subsidize energy audits for home and business owners, which proponents say could generate savings that would far exceed the monthly fee.

A statewide poll commissioned by Clean Energy Progress in December showed 62 percent of likely Colorado voters, including a majority of Republican women, would support...