Earlier this month, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., released her long-anticipated Green New Deal. In it, she aims to change the very fabric of the country. She calls for retrofitting every building in America to make them more “green.” She calls for a job guarantee, in which the government would provide any willing citizen a job paying at least $15 an hour, and she adds that every American should be provided high-quality, affordable health care.

Ocasio-Cortez expands on the Green New Deal in a FAQ, which was later removed from her website but has been made available by various news outlets. She calls for the U.S. to be carbon-free by 2030 while simultaneously decommissioning the country’s nuclear power plants. She waves off a carbon tax as a way to reduce carbon emissions. Her plan includes a provision that guarantees economic security to those who are unwilling to work, even if they physically have the means to do so.

Simply put, Ocasio-Cortez’s vision of a Green New Deal was a slap in the face to environmentalists who were hoping for a proposal that would fight climate disaster. Instead, we’re given a half-baked plan that ostracizes all but the most progressive lawmakers in Congress. Not only will the deal elicit zero Republican support, it will receive little support from the Democratic Party’s more moderate wing. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi already referred to the impractical plan as a “Green New Dream.”

What should the green policy initiative look like, then?

One major aspect ought to be a carbon tax. James Baker, the former Cabinet member in the Reagan and Bush administrations and a Houston native, has a plan: placing a $40 charge on producers for every ton of carbon emitted, gradually increasing in cost over time. The plan would discourage carbon-producing activities by making them more expensive to producers and consumers. Baker also calls for the revenues of such a tax to be returned to citizens to the tune of $2,000 a year for a family of four.

Currently, Alaskans are the only citizens to receive a such a dividend, which they get from a share of oil revenues. The dividend is hugely popular with Alaskans, so one could expect it to receive a similar reception at the federal level.

A green policy initiative should also include ways to incentivize the move to nuclear power. Ocasio-Cortez’s vision declines to build nuclear power plants and sets the long-term goal of decommissioning existing plants. But nuclear power, despite widely publicized incidents in Fukushima and Three Mile Island, is the safest form of power generation. It is even safer than wind and solar because it does not require dangerous climbing to maintain, and it would also create thousands of high-paying jobs for both white- and blue-collar workers.

The initiative should also include federal-government-funded research for carbon-capture technology . The resulting innovations should be patent-free, so that competition can bring down the price and other countries can have access to the technology. Fighting climate change is a global effort, as the U.S. produces only 15 percent of global emissions. Even if we brought down emissions to zero in the U.S. tomorrow, it would not be enough to avert catastrophic warming.

Some Republicans have signaled their interest in working with Democrats on climate change. GOP lawmakers in the past have released carbon tax proposals, but they have been received coldly by the wider Republican Party. Bipartisan support is necessary so that a green policy initiative avoids the same fights that have plagued the Affordable Care Act to this day.

Instead of laying out an ambitious plan to save the country and world from climate disaster, Ocasio-Cortez rolled out a grab bag of progressive economic goals under the auspices of climate action. If her plan is not stopped by Democratic leadership, it will set back climate change policy by years. Instead, our elected representatives must put forth a realistic green policy initiative that works for all Americans.

Mortimer is the executive director of the Neoliberal Project and tweets at @ne0liberal.