Your Opinion: Carbon fee offers climate solution

Dear Editor:

On Sept. 21, The People's Climate March in New York City drew more than 300 thousand marchers. In related events, I spent a day with members of Citizens' Climate Lobby staffing our booth at the Boonville River Festival and at the People's Climate March Support Rally in Columbia. Then I attended a session co-sponsored by the Capital Area Interfaith Alliance and Lincoln University that gave me the most hope for our future.

The program was, "Some Like It Hot!? Religions Respond to Environmental Issues," with the Rev. Clifford Cain, a professor of religious studies at Westminster College. Participants included a wonderfully diverse mix of local faith-based groups. His message was clear that environmental threats, specifically global warming, will not be solved unless faith-based groups join together to influence change.

After briefly recognizing the major scientific studies that make it clear that we need to reduce CO2 emissions to make the future of all life on the planet sustainable, Rev. Cain made the case, religion by religion, why all faith-based groups have a responsibility to care for the universe - however they believe it was created.

It wasn't all lecture. It will take wisdom to solve global warming, and Dr. Cain provided us the formula: knowledge + action = wisdom. Then we broke out into small groups to discuss what actions we could take.

What struck me as most interesting while listening to other participants was the willingness to take action to care for the created universe contrasted by the lack of knowledge about what actions to take. This made me hopeful because creating the will to take action is the big challenge.

The solution is simple, put a fee on carbon and return all the revenue generated back to households. Once citizens have that money back in their pockets, and carbon is priced according to its true cost to society, the rapid transition away from fossil fuels to clean energy and energy efficiency begins. Our communities quickly become more healthy, wealthy and wise - and America leads the world to a sustainable climate.

So what actions can individuals take? They can call, write or walk into congressional offices and have a conversation to support climate action in the form of a revenue-neutral carbon fee and dividend. That's what we do with Citizens' Climate Lobby.