478 #ClimateLegal #USpolitics #RoKhanna
"Exclusive: Khanna Proposes End to 'Unconscionable' Taxpayer Subsidies for Big Oil"
by Jessica Corbett for Common Dreams
https://www.commondreams.org/news/enhanced-oil-recovery
"The fossil fuel industry receives over $20.5 billion in taxpayer dollars every year while fleecing American consumers and driving a global climate crisis," said the California Democrat."
"As fossil fuel giants continue to rake in billions of dollars in profits, U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna on Thursday is reintroducing legislation to end giving billions in taxpayer dollars to companies that inject captured carbon dioxide into wells to extract more climate-wrecking oil.
"The fossil fuel industry receives over $20.5 billion in taxpayer dollars every year while fleecing American consumers and driving a global climate crisis," Khanna (D-Calif.) told Common Dreams."
"While advocates of carbon capture utilization and storage claim that it's necessary to address the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency, most CO2 captured in the United States is used to extract more planet-heating oil and gas, leading many scientists and green groups to argue that it is a "false climate solution."
"Oil drilling is the real story behind the fossil fuel industry's carbon capture obsession," said Jim Walsh, policy director at Food & Water Watch, which has endorsed Khanna's bill.../\..."communities across the country are facing the potential for thousands of harmful industrial projects and tens of thousands of miles of dangerous pipelines that will do little more than put money in the pocket of the fossil fuel industry."
"It's unconscionable that American taxpayers are still subsidizing oil and gas companies to extract even more fossil fuels through so-called 'enhanced oil recovery,'" said Evergreen Action senior energy transition policy lead Mattea Mrkusic. "By eliminating these wasteful tax giveaways, Rep. Ro Khanna's bill takes a crucial step toward ending one of many federal fossil fuel handouts that drive climate pollution."
"It also comes less than six weeks away from the U.S. general election, in which Americans are set to determine the makeup of Congress and the next occupant of the Oval Office. While Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris has the support of nearly every major climate group, former Republican President Donald Trump, who has pledged to swiftly gut federal climate policies if Big Oil puts $1 billion toward his campaign, has been dubbed an existential threat to progress on the climate crisis."
"Fossil fuel companies have raked in astronomical profits at the expense of communities while Big Oil and Gas lobbyists actively work to keep us hooked on their polluting products that perpetuate the climate crisis,"
"Sierra Club is supporting Khanna's bill, as are 350.org, Alliance for Affordable Energy, Center for Biological Diversity, Center for International Environmental Law, Climate Justice Alliance, Environment America, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace USA, Oil Change International, Our Revolution, Oxfam America, Progressive Democrats of America, U.S. PIRG, and Zero Hour."
"We are grateful to Rep. Khanna for leading this legislation and look forward to supporting this and other types of similar legislation that hold Big Oil and Gas companies accountable," Sorour told Common Dreams."
"Earlier this year, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) reintroduced the broader End Polluter Welfare Act, of which Khanna is a co-lead. Its sponsors say that by closing tax loopholes and ending corporate handouts to the fossil fuel industry, that bill "would save American taxpayers up to $170 billion over the next 10 years."
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