Environmental justice advocates in California are assailing state officials for ignoring their call to eliminate a program that lets major polluters avoid paying some penalties for their greenhouse gas emissions.
Groups representing low-income and minority communities plan to fight a state proposal released last week that would tighten California’s carbon market but leave in place a provision the groups say significantly reduces the incentive for polluters to cut emissions.
The groups have been fighting the provision for years and had urged the California Air Resources Board to eliminate or curtail it as part of the overhaul of the carbon market proposed Jan. 13.
“There’s a pretty consistent pattern of [CARB] not really taking our recommendations seriously, of being dismissive of them,” said Catherine Garoupa, a former co-chair of the California Environmental Justice Advisory Committee. She resigned in late 2025 over “growing hostility” from staff at CARB, which runs the carbon market.
