California Carbon Tax Law of 2014.

The California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 designates the State Air Resources Board as the state agency charged with monitoring and regulating sources of emissions of greenhouse gases. The state board is required to adopt a statewide greenhouse gas emissions limit equivalent to the statewide greenhouse gas emissions level in 1990 to be achieved by 2020, and to adopt rules and regulations in an open public process to achieve the maximum, technologically feasible, and cost-effective greenhouse gas emission reductions. The act authorizes the state board to include the use of market-based compliance mechanisms. This bill, effective January 1, 2015, would impose a carbon tax of an unspecified amount per ton of carbon-dioxide-equivalent emissions on suppliers of fossil fuels. The bill would require the State Board of Equalization to administer and implement the carbon tax, and would require revenues from the tax to be deposited in the Carbon Tax Revenue Special Fund in the State Treasury. The bill would exempt suppliers of fossil fuels subject to the tax from regulations imposed by the State Air Resources Board under the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 relative to the compliance obligation in the second compliance period under which suppliers of specified fuels are required to obtain allowances for carbon-dioxide-equivalent emissions under the cap-and-trade program adopted by the State Air Resources Board. The bill would state the intent of the Legislature that revenues from the carbon tax be rebated to taxpayers, particularly low- and medium-income taxpayers, of other taxes, and for implementation of the carbon tax to be revenue neutral. This bill would include a change in state statute that would result in a taxpayer paying a higher tax within the meaning of Section 3 of Article XIII A of the California Constitution, and thus would require for passage, the approval of 23 of the membership of each house of the Legislature. The bill would take effect immediately as a tax levy.