Florida at a climate crossroads: Can the PROVE IT Act offer a solution?

Florida faces a stark reality: rising sea levels, harsher storms, and warming temperatures due to climate change. You might wonder how Florida’s manufacturing sector can be part of the solution. Easy: by supporting the Providing Reliable, Objective, Verifiable Emissions Intensity and Transparency Act (PROVE IT Act), an innovative piece of legislation that could help Florida industries emerge as leaders in carbon efficiency.

Last month, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee passed the PROVE IT Act by an overwhelming bipartisan vote of 14–5. Four Republicans broke from party lines to vote in favor of the Act, which Republican co-sponsor Senator Kevin Cramer from North Dakota has billed an ‘American first’ environmental policy.’

How does it put America first?

By studying the carbon efficiency of major U.S. industries, most of which are cleaner than global competitors. Yet those dirtier manufacturers compete with superior U.S. products on the global market. By collecting this important emissions data, the U.S. sets the stage for carbon pollution fees, which would require dirtier trading partners to either pay us to level the playing field between our varying manufacturing standards or to clean up their act.