Feb. 12, 2008 – Businesses in the San Francisco Bay Area may soon be required to pay an annual fee based on the carbon dioxide they emit. The Bay Area Air Quality Management District has proposed levying a 4.2-cent fee for each metric ton of carbon dioxide a company releases into the atmosphere, the San Jose Mercury News reports.

The fees could prove hefty for the region's biggest emitters. The Shell Oil refinery in Martinez, Calif., would owe $186,475 a year for its 4.4 million annual metric tons of emissions.

"This is the next step in addressing the [global warming] problem," says Jack Broadbent, executive officer of the Bay Area Air Quality Management District. "The public is demanding that we be part of the solution."

The fee is not a tax, according to Broadbent, because revenues will be used to pay for the air district's climate programs.

The air district, a state agency that regulates air pollution in nine counties surrounding San Francisco Bay, could take a final vote on the measure as early as May. If it passes, the regulation may be replicated in other parts of California and the U.S.

In December, California became the first state to require that heavy industry report their greenhouse gas emissions. Emissions reporting and reduction is largely voluntary in the U.S.

Last April, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that carbon dioxide is a pollutant that can be regulated under the Clean Air Act.