Chile:

Chile Plans Carbon Tax (Business Spectator)

President of Chile, Michelle Bachelet

Chile's government wants to impose a tax on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from thermal power plants, the second major economy in Latin America to resort to environmental taxation to discourage the use of carbon-intensive fuels.

On Jan. 1, Mexico imposed a tax on several types of fossil fuels, including gasoline, averaging 3 dollars per tonne of CO2.

According to the proposal presented this week by Chile's President Michelle Bachelet, a center-left politician who returned to the helm of the country on March 11, Chile will charge thermal power generators with a generation capacity equal or higher than 50 megawatts, $5 per tonne of CO2 emitted.

"This measure has the objective to encourage the shift to clean technologies," said the government about the environmental tax in a message sent to Congress this week presenting the reform bill.

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