How an EU tax could slash climate emissions far beyond Europe
Last week, European Union leaders approved the most aggressive climate-change plan in history . The eye-catching part was the $600 billion dedicated to green measures, spread across a massive economic recovery package and the seven-year EU budget approved in concert. All of it will be directed toward achieving the previously announced European Green Deal goal of becoming “climate neutral” by midcentury . But the sweeping deal also set the timetable for implementing a policy that could prove far more powerful—and controversial—than the funding, by providing a way to push down emissions far beyond Europe’s borders. The text of the $2 trillion budget agreement calls for introducing a “carbon border adjustment mechanism” by 2023. In the simplest form it would impose a tax on imported goods produced in ways that emit more greenhouse-gas emissions than are allowed by EU manufacturers. It might apply to a variety of carbon-intensive industries like cement, glass, steel, fertilizer, and f...