A weekly reckoning with life in a warming world—and the fight to save it |
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This is a big, chaotic week for climate news. Here’s a very quick summary of the top items, and an important tip for how to think about it all. On Monday, House Representatives Cori Bush and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez introduced a Green New Deal for Cities, while Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Bernie Sanders reproposed a Green New Deal to modernize public housing (making it safer, while reducing emissions). Kate Aronoff wrote about both bills here. Also on Monday, the United Mine Workers of America announced support for President Biden’s green energy policies as long as the administration and Congress devote funds to provide training and jobs for coal miners. This understandably got a lot of attention. If a true alliance can be built for so-called just transition policies, that could be big! But precisely what this means for Biden’s infrastructure proposals remains to be seen. Thursday, on Earth Day, Biden is scheduled to host a virtual climate summit, at which he will unveil America’s new emissions targets. Administration officials have told Politico they plan to pledge a 50 percent emissions reduction from 2005 levels by 2030. Also on the eve of the summit, European Union officials reached a deal to pledge 55 percent reductions from 1990 levels by 2030. Chinese President Xi Jinping reportedly will attend the summit—the first meeting between him and Biden this year. |
TNR is going to be covering several aspects of this in the coming days. For now, this is the most important thing to know when reading flashy headlines about big climate promises: Emissions targets do not, in and of themselves, mean anything. It’s very easy for countries to blow past them. Officials may praise the ambition of this target or that target, but without actual measures to cut emissions—policies that will reduce fossil fuel production and consumption, for example—ambition accomplishes little. There will be more about this on the site soon. Two more quick things to note: TNR’s Kate Aronoff wrote a book, which was released on Tuesday! She’ll be talking about it with Jane Fonda at a virtual event on Friday. You can get tickets, and buy the book. And finally, if you’re tired of reading about emissions statistics, check out Nick Martin’s latest on what a rock climber who bolted over ancient petroglyphs and the family of a nine-year-old who was thrown by a bison have in common. —Heather Souvaine Horn, deputy editor |
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That’s the amount, Climate Central pointed out on Twitter, by which the average U.S. temperature has warmed since the first Earth Day in 1970. |
Rooftop solar is getting more affordable. (Caveat: This is relative. With solar households having a median income of $113,000 now, compared to $140,000 in 2010, rooftop solar is still very much a class marker, and subsidies for it will still wind up giving money to households that, for the most part, aren’t the ones being hit hardest by climate change and rising energy costs.) |
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People continue to be seduced by biofuels, and particularly wood pellets. The New York Times recently published a good overview of the growing, controversial industry. This is a big fight right now in Massachusetts, where a wood-burning plant is planned for East Springfield. As TNR’s Nick Martin pointed out last week, biofuels almost universally follow the pattern set by the fossil fuel industry, disproportionately polluting marginalized communities. |
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| Elsewhere in the Ecosystem |
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| Molly Taft has a terrifying report at Earther on abandoned oil pipelines in the Gulf. Check it out: |
With 44% of these active pipelines … installed before 2000, the risk of ruptures is increasing. “There’s studies out there saying that after 20 years, the probability of failure increases rapidly,” [Miyoko Sakashita, Oceans Director at the Center for Biological Diversity,] said. “What we’re looking at is old, corroded pipelines that are still out there and active and could have oil spills.” One of the most frustrating things about the report is how easy some of the safety solutions to these problems are—and how the government is lagging behind in implementing them, or just not taking any action at all. |
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