All the howls of protest over creating a cap-and-trade program to deal with greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have succeeded in killing off the idea. The talk in Congress is now focused on a simpler program: carbon taxes.

Instead of forcing the whole country to share in the pain of dealing with climate change, three Senators think they have a better idea, one that could actually win Senate approval. A new climate change bill from Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), John Kerry (D-MA) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT) will target:

• coal-fired power plants
• industrial facilities, and
• transportation.

The heart of this cap-and-trade replacement plan is still to jack up prices for energy generated from fossil fuels. Reason: Higher prices for coal-fired electricity are critical to making wind, solar, biomass, geothermal and nuclear energy commercially viable.

The Senate trio is trying to pitch their new legislation to make American energy independent because, as Sen. Graham told the New York Times, “We are more dependent on foreign oil today than after 9/11.”

Coal-fired power plants will be the first targets of the Graham/Kerry/Lieberman plan. They’d face a GHG emissions cap that would be gradually tightened over time. No details yet on how, or even if, there would be any GHG emission credit allowances given or sold to power plants.

Some years after power plants are regulated, the bill would phase in GHG emission reduction mandates for industrial facilities — such as oil refineries, chemical plants, and pulp and paper mills.

Gasoline and diesel fuels would be hit with a carbon tax to generate revenue the government would then use to subsidize highway projects and electric-car infrastructure, and to defray costs for those hardest hit by higher electric bills.

The feds would also use revenue collected from these carbon taxes to fund alternative energy projects, particularly nuclear energy, as well as carbon capture and storage technologies.

Why is Sen. Graham so interested in alternative energy projects? Clean energy projects mean jobs and a future in South Carolina. General Electric builds all of its wind turbines in Greenville. Graham is also promoting his state as a home for manufacturing nuclear energy and biomass technologies.