如果你觉得目前的能源账单已经很高，等到气候活动人士们如愿以偿时，你的钱就会更少。他们发起了一场大规模的全国性法律战运动，如果成功，这将使普通家庭每年的能源账单增加近1500美元，在十年内接近15000美元。最高法院目前正在审理其中一起案件（塞内克能源公司诉博尔德县委员会）。
If you think your energy bills are high now, just wait until the climate activists get their way. They’ve launched a massive, nationwide campaign of lawfare which, if successful, would raise the average household’s annual energy bill by almost $1,500 per year and nearly $15,000 over a decade. The Supreme Court is currently hearing one such case (Suncor Energy Inc. v. County Commissioners of Boulder County).
这场运动基本上有三个攻击途径： tort诉讼、州级“气候超级基金”法规以及联邦立法。每个类别都代表着巨大的成本负担，最终会转嫁到家庭的加油站和电表上。
The campaign essentially has three avenues of attack: tort litigation, state "climate superfund" statutes and federal legislation. Each category represents enormous charges on upstream suppliers which, of course, will then move downstream to households at the pump and the meter.
超过30起诉讼要求能源公司为未被证实的全球气候变化影响负责，其中包括11个州、华盛顿特区以及数十个城市的诉讼。纽约和佛蒂克通过气候超级基金法简单地立法创造了这种责任——前者上限为750亿美元，后者则没有上限。最高法院可以恢复理智，阻止左派激进的气候议程另外十几个州也尝试实施类似的惩罚措施，国会成员们也提出了所谓的“污染者付款气候基金法”，该法案将在10年内没收1万亿美元。支持者坚称这些措施不会影响家庭钱袋，但事实并非如此。
Over 30 lawsuits demand that energy companies pay for unproven impacts on global climate change, with filings by 11 states, D.C., and dozens of cities. New York and Vermont simply legislated this liability into existence through climate superfund laws — the former capped at $75 billion with the latter leaving liabilities uncapped. SUPREME COURT CAN RESTORE SANITY AND STOP THE LEFT’S RADICAL CLIMATE AGENDA A dozen other states have tried similar penalties, as have members of Congress with the so-called Polluters Pay Climate Fund Act, which would confiscate $1 trillion over 10 years. Supporters insist none of this will hit families’ wallets, that assessments target past production and that shareholders will pay for it.
企业必须将成本转嫁给消费者，这正是将要发生的事情，无论某个政府官员是否宣称这些成本来自过去。这些公司还必须为未来的风险定价，如果企业可能被追溯惩罚30年前的合法活动，这些风险将急剧上升。
Those claims don’t stand up to the facts. Businesses must pass costs to consumers, and that’s exactly what will happen here, regardless of whether some government bureaucrat decrees specific costs to be from yesteryear. Those same firms must also price future risk, which would increase dramatically if business could be retroactively punished for legal activity 30 years ago.
立法者通过新提出的房屋法案中的全面许可制改革，瞄准能源可负担性对于许多发电厂和能源基础设施项目来说，这些项目需要数十年的时间才能收回最初的投资。而这种额外的风险意味着这些项目甚至可能永远不会被启动。对于那些仍然推进的项目，公司必须向消费者收取更高的价格，以抵消不稳定政府可能强加巨额罚款的额外风险。
LAWMAKERS TARGET ENERGY AFFORDABILITY THROUGH SWEEPING PERMITTING OVERHAUL IN NEW HOUSE BILL For many power plants and energy infrastructure projects, which take decades to pay off and recoup initial investments, this additional risk means such projects may never even be undertaken. For those that do move forward, firms must charge consumers higher prices to counter the additional risk of fickle government potentially imposing massive fines.
即使这些成本仅限于股东，而不是率payers或在加油站填满油箱的司机，这些股东仍然是中产阶级美国人。能源股票存放在蓝领工人的养老金和401(k)账户中，如老师、管道工、消防员、电工和警察。DSA的危险细则：他们要来找百万富翁（还有你）“让股东付钱”意味着抢劫退休账户，以资助气候活动家的私人项目，如碳税。
And even if costs were confined to shareholders, as opposed to ratepayers or drivers filling up their tanks, those shareholders are still middle-class Americans. Energy stocks are held in pension funds and 401(k)s of blue-collar workers like teachers, pipefitters, firefighters, electricians and police officers. THE DSA’S DANGEROUS FINE PRINT. THEY'RE COMING FOR MILLIONAIRES (AND YOU) "Making shareholders pay" means raiding retirement accounts to finance the pet projects of climate activists, like carbon taxes.
事实上，帮助发起这场气候法律战运动的律师之一，大卫·布克宾诺(David Bookbinder)，甚至承认期望的结果是一种间接的碳税，公司将以更高的价格将成本转嫁给消费者。
In fact, one of the lawyers who helped launch this climate lawfare crusade, David Bookbinder, even admitted that the desired outcome is an indirect carbon tax, with companies passing costs to consumers in the form of higher prices.
我们的分析也持同意看法，将所有这些诉讼和立法努力的费用估算为每年约1940亿美元。作为对比，这相当于每加仑汽油约41美分，或每千瓦时1.5美分，也就是电费上涨9%，而每加仇41美分约占消费者目前已支付的所有联邦和州汽油税的四分之五。
Our analysis agrees, putting the tab for all these lawsuits and legislative efforts at roughly $194 billion annually. For context, that’s an average of about 41 cents on a gallon of gasoline and 1.5 cents per kilowatt-hour, or a 9% jump in your electricity rate, while 41 cents per gallon is about four-fifths of all the federal and state gas taxes consumers already pay.
民主党人阻毁共和党人降低美国家庭电费的机会，在关键选举事态中这一时点选择得无疵：去年电价已上涨7%，今年年初又上涨9%。六分之一的户家已拖欠能源账单，四分之一的户家已削减食品或医药支支出以支付能源费用。
DEMS KILL REPUBLICAN'S CHANCES OF LOWERING AMERICANS' ELECTRICITY BILLS IN KEY ELECTION FLASHPOINT The timing couldn’t be worse with electricity prices already up 7% last year and 9% again early this year. One in six households is behind on their energy bills, and one in four has cut spending on food or medicine to pay for them.
由于低收入家庭在能源上的支出占收入的比例几乎是其他家庭的四倍，因此气候活动人士所推行的所谓碳税将非常具有倒退性。也许正是为了掩盖这一事实，新泽西州立法者将他们的500亿美元评估费改称为拟议中的《污染者付费使新泽西更便宜法案》。纽约想要管辖爱亚和密苏里州——我们正起诉阻止这一举措但是一项全国性的碳税不太可能通过，因为国会可能会因这一不受欢迎且昂贵的举措而面临选民的问责。
And since low-income families spend nearly four times the share of their income on energy as everyone else, the pseudo-carbon taxes of climate activists would be highly regressive. Perhaps to hide this fact, New Jersey legislators renamed their $50-billion assessment to the proposed "Polluters Pay to Make New Jersey More Affordable Act." NEW YORK WANTS TO GOVERN IOWA AND MISSOURI — WE'RE SUING TO STOP IT COLD But a nationwide carbon tax is unlikely to pass because Congress could be held accountable by voters for such an unpopular and costly measure.
相反地，一项由法院判决和追溯性评估拼凑而成的碳税，是违宪的做法，绕过了选民最终的否决权。
Conversely, a carbon tax cobbled together from court verdicts and retroactive assessments is an unconstitutional way to short-circuit voters’ ultimate veto.
这就是为什么马里兰州最高法院今年年初驳回了其中三起诉讼的原因，并指出，即使采取完美的警示标签等预防措施，也只是全局排放中的沧海一粟。 但法律战不仅仅关乎胜利，因为过程本身就是一种惩罚。驳回判决并不能免除法律费用和其他相关费用。面对法律战，即使能源公司 consistently 获胜，风险溢价仍会上升，相关成本最终会转嫁到客户的账单上。
That’s why Maryland’s Supreme Court threw out three of these suits early this year, observing that even precautions like perfect warning labels would’ve been a drop in the bucket of global emissions. But lawfare isn’t only about winning because the process is the punishment. Dismissals don’t absolve legal fees and other costs. Risk premiums rise in the face of lawfare, even when energy companies consistently win, and the associated costs eventually reach customers’ bills.
更好的道路是增加能源生产，而不是减少，从而降低消费者的成本。可靠的发电厂需要继续运行，新的发电厂也应增添以满足不断增长的需求。另一边所提出的替代方案是一笔无人投票通过的每户家庭年税1500美元。
The better path is to produce more energy, not less, and thereby lower costs for consumers. Reliable power plants need to keep running and new ones should be added to fuel growing demand. The alternative from the other side is a $1,500 annual tax on households that no one voted for.
E.J. Antoni，博士，现任heritage基金会首席经济学家及理查德F.阿斯特研究员，同时也是unleash prosperity的高级研究员。
E.J. Antoni, Ph.D., is Chief Economist and the Richard F. Aster fellow at the Heritage Foundation and a senior fellow at Unleash Prosperity.