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As part of the fiscal instruments that allow reducing pollution, the tax reform project, which the Government socialized this Tuesday with the unions, seeks to modify the carbon tax, broadening the base to include coal in the taxable base of the tax. that is burned to produce energy in thermal power plants or in various industries such as cement and iron and steel.
The change, which is part of four new green taxes, contemplates that the resources collected are used to generate the Climate Fund (Fonclima), which would receive annual income of 1.27 trillion pesos from the carbon tax ( carbon dioxide emissions), a new tax on single-use plastic and pesticides.
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As explained by the Government to the unions, the inclusion of this new tax on coal, which would be charged to those who buy coal to produce energy (thermal plants and industries that use furnaces), will generate a 7 percent increase in the prices of power generation.
However, the Colombian Association of Generators (Andeg), the country’s thermal generators union, explains that, according to their calculations, said increase would be 18 pesos per kilowatt.
The president of the union, Alejandro Castañeda, explained to EL TIEMPO that in the wholesale energy market, generation with coal traditionally sets a kind of ceiling to which hydroelectric plants are very close, which makes it foreseeable that if the cost of energy Thermal with coal rises, so does the energy produced with water and even the cost of renewable energy that is produced with the sun or with the wind.
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Because of this, Andeg estimates that each year end-of-energy consumers, that is, households, industries and companies, will end up paying an additional 1.5 trillion pesos each year.
The foregoing, according to Castañeda, because those who buy coal for their generation or industrial processes would pay a rate of 40,000 pesos for each ton, whose current average price is 150,000 pesos, that is, the tax would be equivalent to 26 percent of the current cost.
And he points out that this tax can also make construction products and supplies more expensive, such as cement and rebar, produced by cement companies and the steel industry.
Contrary effects
Additionally, the manager emphasizes that the scheme in which the Government plans to collect the tax, according to what is known so far from the bill, does not contribute to the objective of encouraging innovation in entrepreneurs to acquire equipment that mitigates CO₂ emissions. the atmosphere.
According to Castañeda, the tax should not be charged on the coal that these agents buy, but on the actual emissions they make into the atmosphere, using measurement equipment that allows to verify the CO₂ emitted.
This is because as their costs increase, those who use coal can begin to buy varieties of coal with more sulfur, which are cheaper, to balance their accounts.
“The tax should be at the exit of industrial use and generation,” adds the president of Andeg.
While the Government estimates that the new annual collection for this tax would be 600,000 million pesos, Andeg indicates that it would be about 250,000 million pesos a year.
Of that value, explains Alejandro Castañeda, the treasury should spend an additional 100,000 million pesos in subsidies, since most of the electricity consumers are in strata 1, 2 and 3.
Regarding the above, the Vice Minister of Finance, Juan Alberto Londoño, He pointed out that this tax will come in gradually and will not be charged during the first two years. And he added that “it is intended to redesign the subsidies, with which the collection will be net when it enters.”
Cars and public transport will pay for pollution
Within the tax reform project that the Government socialized with businessmen and which is in its final adjustments to present itself to Congress after Easter, a component for pollution is included that would be added to the vehicle tax that the almost 16 million pay each year. of vehicles that roll in the country, according to the Single National Traffic Registry (Runt).
Said pollution component for cars, motorcycles, cargo vehicles and public transport will depend on the characteristics of the vehicle and A collection of 400,000 million pesos a year is expected, in addition to the 1.7 trillion pesos that cities and departments collect today for the vehicle tax
automotive.
Likewise, the tax reform project creates taxes on single-use plastics, of 2 pesos per gram (the gram today costs 4.2 pesos) and with which 14,000 million pesos would be collected per year.
Likewise, the initiative creates a tax on the consumption of non-organic pesticides, which seeks to reduce soil contamination, would be included in the consumption tax, would leave an annual collection of 60,000 million pesos and would imply a 1 percent increase in prices. end of these products.
OMAR G. SMOKED RED
Deputy Editor of Economics and Business at EL TIEMPO
On twitter: @omarahu
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