Obama Budget Foresees Billions in Revenues From Carbon Cap

President Obama has unveiled budget projections that foresee the federal government collecting more than $50 billion a year by 2012 from the carbon cap-and-trade system he proposed earlier this week. Administration sources told the Washington Post that $15 billion of carbon cap revenues would go to development of renewable sources of energy, while $60 billion would likely be spent on tax credits to lower- and middle-income families to offset higher energy prices that will result from a cap-and-trade system. Obama’s budget director, Peter Orzag, recently told Congress that a cap-and-trade program would generate $50 billion to $300 billion in revenue a year. Democratic leaders in Congress plan to move swiftly to pass carbon cap legislation, but they are sure to face stiff opposition from legislators in the midwest and south whose states are heavily dependent on coal to generate electricity.