By Roger Straw, May 19, 2019
A jogger runs past the Scattergood natural gas power plant on Feb. 12, 2019, in Los Angeles. Photo: Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP
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Their Environment section is especially worthy – check out these stories and more:
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By Elise Swain, The Intercept, May 4 2019, 6:00 a.m.
Photos: Getty Images (2); Animation: The Intercept
FOCUSING ON BREATH and gratitude, Dahr Jamail’s latest book, “The End of Ice: Bearing Witness and Finding Meaning in the Path of Climate Disruption,” stitches together personal introspection and gut-wrenching interviews with leading climate experts. The rapidly receding glaciers of Denali National Park, home to the highest peak in North America, inspired the book’s title. “Seven years of climbing in Alaska had provided me with a front-row seat from where I could witness the dramatic impact of human-caused climate disruption,” Jamail writes.
With vividly descriptive storytelling, Jamail pushes further north into the Arctic Circle where warming is occurring at double speed. He surveys rapid changes in the Pribilof Islands, where Indigenous communities have had to contend with die-offs affecting seabirds, fur seals, fish, and more — a collapsing food web. The story continues in the fragile Great Barrier Reef, utterly ravaged by the warming ocean. South Florida is faring no better: Jamail finds that 2.46 million of the state’s acreage will be submerged within his lifetime. Experts are aghast everywhere Jamail visits. In the Amazon, rich in biodiversity, the consequences are especially enormous.
“The End of Ice” readers won’t find calls for technology-based solutions, politicians, mitigating emissions, or the Green New Deal to save us.
Describing the current state of the planet, Jamail likens it to someone in hospice care. The global mean temperature is already 1 degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Not half a decade ago, leading climate scientist James Hansen warned that that 1 degree would usher in a crisis of sea-level rise, melting Arctic ice, and extreme weather. He concluded that the goal of limiting global warming to only 2 degrees was “very dangerous.” Accelerated melting in the Arctic continues to surpass conservative predictions. Jamail reminds us that “as rapidly as global temperatures are increasing, so are temperature predictions. The conservative International Energy Agency has predicted a possible worst-case scenario of a 3.5°C increase by 2035.”
Little has worked to inspire action. There is perhaps no better example of climate science being disregarded than a climate change denier being elected president of the United States.
The threat of looming biosphere apocalypse is deeply troubling, panic-inducing, and this all-encompassing environmental, economic, and spiritual problem leaves one feeling helpless and grief-stricken. “The End of Ice” takes on the full weight of the catastrophe at hand. Jamail carries the reader’s emotional pain by acutely expressing his own.
“The End of Ice: Bearing Witness and Finding Meaning in the Path of Climate Disruption” by Dahr Jamail. Photo: Courtesy of The New Press
“A willingness to live without hope allows me to accept the heartbreaking truth of our situation, however calamitous it is. Grieving for what is happening to the planet also now brings me gratitude for the smallest, most mundane things,” Jamail explains. “I have found that it’s possible to reach a place of acceptance and inner peace, while enduring the grief and suffering that are inevitable as the biosphere declines.”
“This global capitalist experiment, this experiment of industrialization and burning fossil fuels rampantly is an utter, abject failure,” Jamail told The Intercept. He believes it is time to start adapting. We should act like the climate crisis has arrived and, most significantly, reconnect to the planet. Jamail spoke to The Intercept about his latest book and dealing with the grief of reporting from the frontlines of the war in Iraq to the frontlines of climate disruption. The interview that follows has been edited for clarity.
Dahr Jamail reads an excerpt from his book “The End of Ice” on the Intercepted podcast beginning at 54:57.
Your book really blindsided me in a way that I didn’t expect. I was thinking it would be another dry, hard to read, statistic-heavy work, but instead you told stories that were really rich with genuine interactions and emotions and talked about your own emotional state while you were reporting on all of this. So just tell me about that approach to writing and how you felt during these interviews with all of these scientists and researchers.
To go out and go to these frontline places like the Great Barrier Reef or Denali or St. Paul Island in the Pribilof, the Everglades down in South Florida, places that were being hit the hardest, the fastest — I knew that I would have a very personal and emotional reaction to that. And so all these places like the Great Barrier Reef and Denali and a couple of others that I have long-term intimate relationships with, I’d watch them over time. Most people aren’t going to get to go to most of these places. So it was really my effort to go try to bring that to them through my writing the best that I could.
I went out and was awestruck, completely blown away by the majesty of these places, getting these moments of: Look at this incredible planet. Look at these hanging glaciers on Denali. Look at these fish at the Great Barrier Reef. And then simultaneously, the heartbreak of going back to a glacier and the whole glacier’s just gone and feeling that gut punch.
That’s what it felt like. Or going back to the Great Barrier Reef: It’s a World Heritage Site. It’s this wonder of the natural world. And snorkeling over areas where all you can see is bleached white coral and knowing most of that’s going to die and having it be utterly silent, devoid of fish life, and feeling that. So it was this simultaneous experience of awe and gratitude for this planet and then heartbreak over what’s happening to it.
Explain that term you use for climate change, which was once “global warming”; you’re calling it “anthropogenic climate disruption.” So why are you making that distinction?
I use the term “human-caused or anthropogenic climate disruption” instead of climate change or global warming for a couple of different reasons. The first and foremost is, it’s the most scientifically accurate because by essentially geoengineering the climate, which is what we’ve done by injecting so much CO2 into the atmosphere, we have disrupted the climate. And then the other reason is that there was fossil fuel influence on climate change decades ago for that to become the more commonly used moniker descriptor: “change” because it’s not as alarming as climate crisis or climate disruption or climate catastrophe.
One of the things that you talk about in the book a lot is the disconnection that we as a human species are having from the planet at this point.
We can ignore it or at least pretend to ignore it and not feel like these impacts are directly affecting us. And for a lot of us still living in that bubble, we can still get away with that.
Well, it’s Western colonial society. It essentially trains us to be disconnected from the planet. It doesn’t predispose us to go and live directly in relationship with the Earth. We don’t have to go to a stream to go get our water. We don’t have to go hunt or grow our food if we don’t want to. It’s the opposite of indigenous lifestyle, traditionally. So that’s why I believe the fundamental cause of climate disruption is our inherent disconnect from the planet. “Our” being those of us living, most of us living in Western industrialized society. And the solution is first, we have to start with reconnecting. And I think that’s why we don’t see climate disruption in the headlines on a regular basis because so many of us are living in big cities, getting our food from grocery stores; our water, turn on the tap. There’s your water.
We can ignore it or at least pretend to ignore it and not feel like these impacts are directly affecting us. And for a lot of us still living in that bubble, we can still get away with that. I think that’s changing before our very eyes, but I think that really is the root cause of this crisis — is this disconnect. Because if we were living closer to the earth, like indigenous people did for thousands and thousands of years, you’re so finely attuned to the weather. And when the rains come and when the droughts come and being able to read things like that and watching what the animals do and making decisions based on that — you’re going to take a lot better care of the place where you live, if you’re living that much more closely to it. And obviously you’re going to not take as good of care of it if you’re completely disconnected from it.
So just to go back to the first book that you wrote about reporting from the frontlines in Iraq to now in this book reporting from the frontlines of climate change: Those are really tough topics to sit with and deal with for a long time.
As devastating as reporting on Iraq was to me, personally — war is an extremely hard thing to live with and figure out how to contend with and then dealing with the PTSD and all of this that comes with it. And that’s something then that I get to live with for the rest of my life and anyone who’s been in war does. It never goes away; you just learn to live with it.
But the climate crisis and this book has been that but on a deeper level because it really regularly kicks in fight or flight, for example of, “Oh my God, we’re losing 2.4 percent of our insect population, 2.4 percent of the insect biomass of the planet annually. That means on this current trajectory, assuming it doesn’t accelerate, that means no more insects within a hundred years. No more insects pretty much means no more humans.” And so that feeling that comes up knowing that there’s a fear. There’s a panic. There’s a fight or flight. Where do I go? I can’t go anywhere. This is our only planet and so all those feelings and that grief that comes up, you’re going to get to deal with that.
And so if this is what’s happening to our very planet, then there’s going to be an ongoing dance with grief that comes up of sadness, of rage at the people responsible, of this kind of internal schizophrenia of, “Yeah, and I still drive, and I still fly, and yet I’m writing this book about the climate crisis.” All of us living embedded in this Western civilization, that’s a dance that we all get to contend with on a daily basis if we really start to tease out our own feelings.
So I want to get into some of the details on different chapters in the book. Can you talk to me a little bit about the glacier melt in the Arctic regions that you were in and what sort of future we’re looking at in that ecosystem?
If we look at what’s happening to glaciers around the globe as the planet has warmed up considerably, we are losing ice at ever accelerating rates. And so one of the things I did is, I went out on the Gulkana Glacier in the Alaska range with the U.S. Geological Survey crew who do an annual mass balance survey. They basically go out on the ice and dig pits and take measurements and plant stakes and use radar and measure how much ice is being lost on an annual basis. There’s several of these around North America that they measure and, in that way, have a very, very accurate chronicle, statistically, of how much ice is being lost over time.
Essentially, what we know is that glaciers are on track, for example, in the contiguous 48 states that at current trajectories and current emission rates, if these continue, there will be probably no glaciers anywhere left in the contiguous 48 states by 2100. I went out into the field in Glacier National Park with Dr. Dan Fagre, and he told me that essentially Glacier National Park will have no functional glaciers by 2030. So that’s less than 11 years from now.
And then if we zoom out of the Hindu Kush region of the Himalaya where it’s heavily glaciated: There’s a massive ice field. Seven of Asia’s biggest rivers are sourced there. That ice is on trajectory to go away, possibly even completely, by 2100. In which case, the 1.5 billion people that get their water for drinking and agriculture from those waters, where do they go? What do they do? What happens to the areas where they migrate because they’ll have to migrate? We can’t live someplace where there’s not potable water and water for irrigating crops. So when glaciers go away, it’s a big deal to humans. And a lot of people don’t think about this.
Can you tell me about your trip to the Great Barrier Reef and what you saw there? There’s something to be said about the coral reef phenomenon in talking about climate change because it is one of the things that people can connect to in an emotional way. Human beings hate seeing beautiful things get destroyed. We really don’t like it. So as a visual person, I think that’s an interesting way to approach climate change: Show people the coral reefs and what we’re losing.
At the risk of sounding cheesy or cliche, it’s part of that reconnection process to the planet. And you know, when I wrote this book, I hoped that if I had one goal of the book was that someone would read it and then put it down and go outside to wherever their favorite place is to connect into the Earth — whether it’s a park or a river or the ocean or the mountains or pasture or what have you — because we’ve forgotten. We have forgotten. Look at this incredible planet where we live. Just go out and look at a tree with birds in it and just watch them for a couple of minutes. Look at all of this. Nature is doing all of this by itself.
And then look at what we’ve done, and look at what our actions are causing. We have to take that in, and I think that’s where we get back into this dance of the beauty and the awe and the amazement and the love simultaneous with, “Look at how shockingly fast we’re losing it all.” I mean, because we are losing it. We have failed. This experiment, this global capitalist experiment, this experiment of industrialization and burning fossil fuels rampantly is an utter, abject failure. And all of the global governments — of course, some are doing it a little less worse than others — but at this point, all of the global governments have failed abjectly in responding to this crisis accordingly. And so again, all of that puts the onus back on each of us now. How are we individually going to respond?
I grew up in Florida, in Sarasota. It’s a coastal city on the Gulf of Mexico. And I’ve essentially had this understanding my whole life that one day, probably within my lifetime, my hometown will be completely underwater. So it’s absurd: the fact that, one, we have Donald Trump and a climate-change-denying administration, but two, on a state level, we have climate-change-denying leadership at the top in a state that will be completely, wholly affected by climate change more so maybe than any other state. But can you just tell me about what you learned in Miami and in the Everglades?
That particular chapter working on sea level rise in Florida was — to put it as clearly and bluntly as I can: It was a mindfuck.
It was so incredible to be in this place that is ground zero for sea level rise. It’s happening more intensely and faster there as it is anywhere else in the world, and you also have some of the leading sea level rise experts on the planet. They’re out of University of Miami — Ben Kirtman and Harold Wanless, both of whom I interviewed for the book. And there I am in Miami Beach going around with the then-city engineer Bruce Mowry, who’s actively working to raise several of the streets three feet, knowing that’s not enough, but, “OK, this is going to buy us enough time. We’re going to save Miami Beach. We can try to mitigate this.” Conveniently ignoring things like well, it’s actually the whole city is based on what was essentially a mangrove swamp. There’s this porous limestone underneath it that — guess what —water comes up through it.
There’s already large areas in Miami Beach and some areas of Miami that flood in the middle of a sunny day, in the middle of a drought, and people are just putting on their rubber boots and walking through it. There’s fish swimming at times literally across the roads. And so you’re living on ground zero for sea level rise with this fossil-fuel-funded leadership. Then simultaneous to that, you have scientists like Dr. Wanless who told me, “Look, I know for a fact that Marco Rubio is aware of what I’m telling you about how much sea level rise is already baked in.” It’s not out of the realm of possibility we could see 10 feet by 2050. We could see far more than that by 2100. I mean, South Florida is basically gone. All those millions of people, and all of that infrastructure, and all of those toxic sites that have to be cleaned up, and the Turkey Point nuclear plant just south of Miami at six feet elevation — all of that has to be decommissioned and moved to higher ground. All of the archives, hospitals, colleges, everything, right? And that needs to start yesterday. And instead, you have this denial. Nothing’s happening.
I want to talk about one moment in the book that completely gutted me, and I hadn’t heard this information anywhere else. You were speaking to, as you mentioned, Dr. Harold Wanless in Miami, and you write about the conversation: “In the past, atmospheric CO2 varied from roughly 180 to 280 parts per million as the Earth shifted from glacial to interglacial periods. This 100 ppm fluctuation was linked with about a 100-foot change in sea level.” And so that means we’ve gone from 280 ppm to our current level, right now, of 410 ppm of carbon in the atmosphere. So what does that mean?
That means that we have, at least in theory, 130 feet of sea level rise that’s already baked into the system. 130 feet means goodbye, Florida. Well, basically all of South Florida. That means goodbye to every major coastal city on the planet. And then where do those people go? What happens to those economies? How do we relocate all those people? I mean, this means literally a completely different planet by itself, and that’s what’s there.
And we have to remember too that in conjunction with that, there’s a NASA report that I discuss in the book that discusses how back in the Pliocene, roughly 3 million years ago when there was roughly the same amount of CO2 in the atmosphere as there is now because of us: Sea levels were minimum 20 meters higher than they are today. The average global temperature was 3 to 4°C higher than it is now, and there were parts of the globe where it was 10°C higher.
We’re seeing geologic change happening on human timescale. We’re looking at change faster than what happened during the Permian mass extinction, which up to now was the single deadliest mass extinction event in the planet’s history. 252 million years ago, 90 percent of all life on Earth went extinct, and we have injected CO2 in the atmosphere at a rate dramatically faster than what caused that mass extinction event.
An aerial view of homes destroyed by the Camp Fire on Feb. 11, 2019, in Paradise, Calif. Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Let’s talk about wildfires. You wrote, “Climate disruption is already responsible for nearly half of the forest area burns across the western United States over the last 30 years.” That’s pretty shocking.
It is. I live in the Pacific Northwest. You say that, most people picture rainforests, lots of rain, wet Seattle, gray, all of this. And yet we have already, as we speak right now on Earth Day, have had 50 wildfires in Washington State, where I live. That’s normally the number we have by late August and into October, which is peak wildfire season. There are towns that are literally becoming unlivable. If you have respiratory issues, you can’t live in a town that’s completely engulfed in wildfire smoke for weeks on end.
There are towns that are literally becoming unlivable. If you have respiratory issues, you can’t live in a town that’s completely engulfed in wildfire smoke for weeks on end.
It’s truly incredible when you look at the fact that once we hit 3 degrees Celsius warming (we’re at 1.1 degrees Celsius now), many scientists tell us that if we stopped all fossil fuel emissions on a dime, we have a minimum of 3 degrees Celsius warming already baked into the system. That means a sextupling of the amount of wildfires in the American West. If you look at what’s happened to California, just as an example, over the last couple of years, multiply that by six.
So we are right there on the edge of these impacts. But one thing that I want to remind folks: It is easy to think in the United States, “Oh, well, so much of this is happening so much worse in other countries.” Well, if you live in Paradise, California, there’s no more future tense about the climate crisis to you. If you’ve just lost everything and you know someone who’s died and if you made it out of that alive, barely: You just lived through the apocalypse.
Talk about the emotional parallels of working both as a war correspondent and covering climate change. I believe you described it as a kind of grief.
There is a deep, deep grief that comes up, and the way I’ve written about it in the book is I shared a story about a dear friend of mine: Duane French, a quadriplegic man that I used to work for, as his personal assistant, up in Alaska when I first moved up there in the mid-’90s. And a few years ago, he got pneumonia, and I thought for sure, “He’s dead.” He was in the ICU for weeks on end, and none of the drugs were working, and I really believed I was in a hospice situation with him. And so all that mattered to me was to really be as present as I could and appreciate each moment that I had while he was still here.
So what can I do? Where does my motivation come from if things really do appear to be lost? That’s where I had a big conversation with a Cherokee medicine man named Stan Rushworth, actually. He reminded me of the difference between the colonial settler mindset of, “We have rights,” versus the indigenous philosophy of, “We’re all born onto the planet with obligations.” The two big ones that he shared with me are: an obligation to take care of, and be a steward of, the planet; and an obligation to serve future generations and make my decisions based on what’s going to take the best care of them. And so no matter how dire things look today, if I get up and I ask myself, “OK, how can I be of best service today to the planet and to the children?” Then I have my work cut out for me, and there is no shortage of things to do. And I am morally obliged to do everything in my power possible to try to help somehow, whatever that’s going to look like.
So at most points in these conversations about climate, the conversation turns to hope for the future at the end, but I don’t really want to talk about hope, you know, in the sense of that meaning solutions. I want to know how you’ve been dealing with the weight of this material and how you’ve personally come to define hope.
Right, I had to really tackle the hope versus hopelessness paradigm. To sum it up, upfront, I quote Vaclav Havel who said, “Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well but the certainty that something is worth doing no matter how it turns out.” With hope in the context of the climate crisis in these movements: Someone else, or some party, or some movement’s going to do something — even if I’m part of that — and then something in the future is going to happen. And I think it takes us out of ourselves, and it definitely takes us out of the present moment. And right now, in this second, in me, this is where all my agency is. So whatever actions I do right now, that’s what really, really matters, and I have to take full responsibility for that. And I think that’s what I’m getting to: accepting that we have a minimum of 3°C baked into the system. That is absolutely catastrophic. No one’s going to argue how catastrophic that is.
And yes, more is needed. And yes, it looks like all may be lost but I just have to keep coming back to that. What gets me out of bed in the morning, and what are my obligations? And when I come from that place, then I feel actually more passionately about this than ever before and certainly even before I wrote the book.
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An email from JayInslee.com
[Editor: this is much more than a campaign solicitation for money. Check out Inslee’s 100% Clean Energy for America plan. – R.S.]
Governor Jay Inslee, candidate for President
Dear ____________,
I recently announced my first policy proposal of this presidential campaign — a landmark proposal to move the country forward by leaps and bounds toward a 100% clean energy future.
My comprehensive 100% Clean Energy for America plan will achieve 100% clean electricity, eliminate the sale of new oil-powered vehicles by 2030 and require all new buildings to have 100% zero-carbon emissions. This is about ensuring a clean, safe, and prosperous future for each and every American.
Don’t just take my word for it: I put my entire proposal, word for word, right below this message. I encourage you to read it, all 2,840 words.
This builds off the significant progress we’ve made here in Washington state — progress that is already showing results. I’m the only candidate in this race who has actually run a government that has made climate change policy central to its administration, and we have made real progress as a result. I know firsthand how much economic and entrepreneurial opportunity there is in saving the planet. There’s incredible economic upside and job creation in investing to save our planet — and there’s no time to waste.
And that’s why I’m showing you the whole thing, right here, because we all have a huge stake in getting this right.
Very truly yours,
Jay
100% Clean Energy for America Plan
Governor Jay Inslee’s plan for 100% clean electricity, vehicles and buildings
Climate change is the defining challenge of our time — and it demands a bold and aggressive national policy for America. The next president must enact the most ambitious clean energy policy in American history, building on the success of states to create a 100% clean energy economy.
Governor Jay Inslee’s 100% Clean Energy for America Plan will achieve 100% clean electricity, 100% zero-emission new vehicles and 100% zero-carbon new buildings. This plan will empower America to make the entire electrical grid and every new car and building climate pollution-free, at the speed that science and public health demand.
The 100% Clean Energy for America Plan is the first major policy announcement in Governor Inslee’s Climate Mission agenda — a bold 10-year mobilization to defeat climate change and create millions of good-paying jobs building a just, innovative and inclusive clean energy future, with meaningful targets and plans for execution based on his experience as a governor. Governor Inslee will announce additional major planks of his detailed climate plan in the coming weeks.
The climate crisis is urgent. Americans are already feeling its accelerating impacts — with front-line, low-income and communities of color being impacted first and worst. Since launching his climate-focused campaign, Governor Inslee has seen these impacts up close, from touring wildfire damage in California to flood damage in Iowa. He knows we cannot afford to wait any longer for action.
In a 2018 report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) made our challenge very clear: To avoid the worst impacts of climate change, the global community must cut climate pollution in half by 2030, and achieve global net-zero pollution by mid-century. Governor Inslee’s plans will ensure that America meets these IPCC targets and leads the world in defeating climate change. As the world’s largest historical emitter of climate pollution and the global leader in technology innovation, America will be among the first to achieve that net-zero target, as fast as possible, and by no later than 2045.
Governor Inslee’s 100% Clean Energy for America Plan is a 10-year action plan that starts with immediate executive action on day one. By 2030, his plan will:
Reach 100% zero emissions in new light- and medium-duty vehicles and all buses;
Achieve 100% zero-carbon pollution from all new commercial and residential buildings; and
Set a national 100% Clean Electricity Standard, requiring 100% carbon-neutral power by 2030, putting America on a path to having all clean, renewable and zero-emission energy in electricity generation by 2035.
We cannot tackle the existential threat of climate change by merely addressing climate pollution from one sector of our economy. We must reduce it everywhere.
Collectively, the transportation, electricity and buildings sectors contribute nearly 70% of America’s climate pollution. It’s time to build our grid, modernize our auto industry, and invest in clean buildings to rise to the climate challenge and succeed in the coming global clean energy economy.
We know we can achieve this plan because it’s already happening in states, and in cities, tribal nations, and local communities. States have set aggressive renewable portfolio standards and passed 100% clean energy plans, all while Donald Trump has tried to undermine America’s climate progress. Governor Inslee led Washington state to pass the strongest policy for 100% clean electricity in the country, with the largest labor and environmental groups united in support. Now he will take that model national with the creation of his 100% Clean Energy for America Plan.
Mimicking actions taken in Washington state, this plan includes closing America’s coal-fired power plants and making major investments to ensure a just transition, including good-paying jobs for workers and support for vulnerable communities. Every region will begin its path to 100% clean energy from a different starting point, and this plan will meet each of them where they are — ensuring opportunity and participation for all in the clean energy economy.
The 100% Clean Energy for America Plan will require a massive, full-scale mobilization of our federal government that will spur major innovation and deployment of clean energy. Just as President Kennedy’s clarion call for a “moonshot” spurred major technological breakthroughs, these aggressive clean energy targets will provoke a clean energy revolution.
Instead of investing our tax dollars in fossil fuel companies, we will invest in deploying renewable energy, advancing battery technology, manufacturing the next generation of electric cars, and creating more energy-efficient buildings. In doing so, we will create demand for new manufactured products and skilled construction jobs, and spur major innovation in everything from building materials to advanced energy technologies. We can put millions of Americans to work building new energy solutions, sustainable infrastructure, and pollution-free communities. Furthermore, this plan will lead to massive savings over the long-term, as Americans pay less to heat their homes, fuel their cars and rebuild their communities hit by climate change.
Americans are already paying the price for climate change. Climate change cost the U.S. economy at least $240 billion per year during the past decade, and that figure is projected to rise to $360 billion per year in the coming 10 years. We cannot afford the cost of inaction. We can choose between two roads: guaranteed economic decline from extreme weather, or increasing prosperity from a clean energy economy and low-cost, electrified transportation. Transitioning to 100% clean vehicles, buildings and electricity will free Americans from the stranglehold of rising gas prices and provide permanent savings on heating their homes.
Through a national Climate Mission agenda, we will mobilize America to confront climate change, end reliance on fossil fuels and build our clean energy future. The 100% Clean Energy for America Plan is a critical starting point: We must establish smart rules and clear goals if we are going to unleash a new generation of innovation. Implementation of this plan will begin on the Inslee Administration’s first day. And much of this plan can be accomplished using authorities and programs Congress has already established for the executive branch, including the federal Clean Air Act, while other elements will require new legislation.
During the coming weeks, Governor Inslee will introduce additional major policies as part of a national Climate Mission — including: increasing strategies to slash climate pollution from the transportation sector and from existing buildings; making major investments in clean energy jobs, infrastructure and innovation; supporting clean and competitive manufacturing and sustainable and thriving agriculture; advancing environmental justice and economic inclusion; and bringing an end to fossil fuel giveaways.
100% Clean Electricity
Through the 100% Clean Energy for America Plan, America will move swiftly to achieve 100% clean, renewable and zero-emission energy in electricity generation, using the strength of federal investment and policy to accelerate the transition that is under way thanks to state and local leadership. This clean electricity will be the backbone of our economy, powering our homes, vehicles, and industry.
The plan sets ambitious yet technologically achievable goals that respond to the reality of climate science, while unlocking a massive new wave of productive and job-creating investment. This plan includes:
Setting a bold national 100% Clean Electricity Standard, requiring utilities to achieve 100% carbon-neutral power by 2030, and all-clean, renewable and zero-emission energy in electricity generation by 2035. This builds upon and accelerates momentum toward 100% clean electricity — policy that has been adopted in Washington state, California, Hawaii, New Mexico, D.C., and Puerto Rico, and a target to which more than 100 American cities and counties are committed, from Concord, N.H., to Columbia, S.C.
Guaranteeing support for workers and community transition — following Washington state’s model to ensure that the creation of clean energy projects results in many good, family-wage jobs, and that all communities benefit in the transition to a carbon-free power future. Includes promoting projects with businesses owned by women and people of color; apprenticeship utilization; prevailing wages determined through collective bargaining; and community workforce and project-labor agreements.
Establishing refundable tax incentives to speed the development and deployment of clean technologies — including renewable electricity, energy storage, smart grid and advanced transmission and distribution, as well as other zero-emission technologies.
Ensuring broad and equitable participation by working with utilities to increase on-bill investment in energy efficiency and distributed energy solutions, and making greater federal investment available to front-line and low-income communities — with priority placed upon comprehensive community-developed projects with multiple benefits.
Retiring the increasingly uneconomic U.S. coal fleet by 2030 to eliminate dangerous pollution and repower our economy with job-creating clean energy. Governor Inslee’s 100% clean electricity plan in Washington state includes a ban on coal power starting in 2025. And, as in Washington state, the 100% Clean Energy for America Plan includes support for workers and communities that are moving beyond coal power.
Using federal lands, offshore waters and facilities to deploy more renewable energy and transmission. The federal government can accelerate renewable energy deployment on public lands that contain enormous resources — especially in the West. For example, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Dry Lake Solar Energy Zone in Clark County, Nev. now hosts 179 MW of solar power in job-creating clean energy projects that were developed more than twice as fast as traditional projects on public lands. Meanwhile, harnessing just 1% of our nation’s technical offshore wind energy resource potential could power more than 6 million American homes.
Activating existing federal energy financing programs (e.g. the U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Utilities Service and the U.S. Department of Energy Loan Guarantee Program) to catalyze new investments that further speed this transition. And providing direct grants for clean energy projects developed by non-profit and community organizations, local governments, and academic institutions.
Expanding long-distance interstate and interregional transmission of clean electricity through expedited planning, broad cost allocation, and negotiated siting with state authorities, Regional Transmission Organizations (RTOs), the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the Department of Energy. And providing federal financing for anticipatory construction of transmission capacity to areas with significant queues of clean-energy generation capacity awaiting transmission.
Enhancing utilization of existing transmission and distribution assets through Dynamic Line Ratings, demand-response, new sensors and controls, battery storage, and resilient distributed energy resources.
Accelerating the evolution toward performance-based utility regulation that rewards utilities for delivering affordable, reliable, and zero-emission electricity.
By achieving 100% clean electricity we will enable our nation to meet more of its energy needs without burning fossil fuels, including for transportation and buildings — two of the other leading sources for the carbon pollution that is driving climate change.
100% Clean New Vehicles
The 100% Clean Energy for America Plan will achieve by 2030 zero emissions in all new light-duty passenger vehicles, medium-duty trucks, and buses. These are crucial strategies for decarbonizing the transportation sector and eliminating tailpipe pollution that contaminates our air — and that especially harms front-line and low-income communities.
They are also essential for ensuring that U.S. industries stay at the leading edge of global automotive manufacturing, as our economic competitors in China, India and Europe are setting clear targets to move to 100% electric and zero-emission vehicles (ZEVs).
This plan will ensure ZEVs are made in the U.S.A., by union workers, and that they are affordable for working families. ZEVs are already cheaper for American commuters to drive, with fuel costs averaging just $1.13 per “gallon,” compared with the $2.62 national average. Also, while vehicles represent a significant portion of U.S. transportation-sector climate pollution (light-duty vehicles account for approximately 60%), this plan will be followed by the release of additional proposals targeting pollution reductions in other modes of transportation. To reach 100% zero-emission new vehicles, this plan includes:
Implementing a new standard for clean cars — requiring robust annual improvements in vehicle emissions for light, medium — and heavy-duty vehicles to help break America’s oil addiction. This standard will accelerate the deployment of ZEVs, reaching 100% ZEVs in light- and medium-duty new vehicle sales by 2030.
Establishing a Clean Fuels Standard that promotes electric and other low-carbon alternative fuels for vehicles.
Dedicating significant new federal investments to support a diverse and robust American ZEV manufacturing base, including a critical materials strategy, as well as the creation and recycling of advanced batteries and component parts.
Expanding business and consumer tax credits to ensure availability and affordability of ZEVs and increase their adoption — including an extended and expanded consumer Electric Vehicle Tax Credit — and working with states to establish feebates to increase the value of ZEVs for new buyers.
Creating a new “Clean Cars for Clunkers” program to offer fuel-economy based trade-in rebates for consumers to exchange their fuel-inefficient cars or trucks for new ZEVs. Like the 2009 “Cash for Clunkers” program, this initiative will drive increased American auto manufacturing and sales, this time for ZEVs.
Requiring rapid electrification of the federal government vehicle fleet and working in partnership with state, local and tribal governments to accelerate electrification of their fleets. Federal procurement can dramatically increase market demand.
Partnering with states, tribal nations, local governments and utilities in a massive investment to deploy electric vehicle charging infrastructure. In Washington state, Governor Inslee created an Electric Vehicle (EV) Infrastructure Bank to deploy investment in charging stations.
Providing federal financing to support state and local governments transitioning to zero-emission bus fleets for transit and school buses, and allowing transit agencies to retire diesel buses early without penalty. In addition to cutting climate pollution, zero-emission buses help eliminate harmful diesel pollution. States and cities throughout the U.S. are moving rapidly toward zero-emission buses; California, for example, has committed to all zero-emission new buses by 2029.
Together, these efforts will begin the transition of all new cars and buses in the U.S. to clean vehicles. In addition to clean cars and buses, the Climate Mission that Governor Inslee has called for will include a wide range of transportation-sector pollution-reduction strategies, including in large trucks and heavy-duty vehicles, aviation, marine, transit, rail, and other multi-modal solutions, as well as affordable housing, urban density, and smart growth.
100% Clean New Buildings
Finally, the 100% Clean Energy for America Plan includes immediate federal action to achieve before 2030 zero-carbon pollution from all new commercial and residential buildings.
Climate pollution from buildings increased a full 10% in the U.S. in 2018 — driven by natural gas used in space and water heating and cooling. This plan will reverse that trend, and improve indoor air quality, by increasing energy efficiency and taking advantage of clean electricity in building electrification. This includes:
Creating a national Zero-Carbon Building Standard by 2023, and partnering with states and cities to integrate this standard into new and stronger state and local building codes. This plan will include stronger federal incentives for local governments to enforce standards to adopt “stretch-codes,” and for building owners to more rapidly adopt advanced sustainability in new buildings. Here, too, states and cities are already leading the way: The city of Los Angeles has announced its plan for all zero-carbon new buildings by 2030.
Accelerating implementation of the federal Fossil Fuel-Generated Energy Consumption Reduction rule to eliminate by 2023 fossil-fuel use — including coal, fuel oil and natural gas — in all new and renovated federal buildings.
Directing federal agencies in 2021 to accelerate proven appliance energy efficiency standards and to promote zero-emission appliances — including water heaters and dryers. This will help make American-manufactured appliances both cleaner and more competitive in global markets, all while saving consumers money.
Providing federal funding to train builders, inspectors, energy managers, equipment technicians, and janitors in proven strategies that cut down on wasted energy in buildings.
Establishing tax incentives for energy efficiency and electrification in new construction of residential and commercial buildings, including targeted incentives for homeowners and building owners to install highly efficient heat pumps for space and water heating.
Dramatically increasing access to federal financing to fund both retrofits and new construction to upgrade schools and public building stock for federal, state, local and tribal governments.
Driving new private capital investment into clean energy projects by providing clear policy guidance for Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) and support for expansion of Energy Saving Performance Contracts (ESPCs) that promote both portfolio-scale green building retrofits and new net-zero energy construction.
Linking energy and climate pollution standards to expanded federal support for new construction projects, including through U.S. Department of Housing & Urban Development (HUD) and Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) investments, and federal housing tax credits, as well as through green mortgage products offered by federal housing finance agencies.
Renewing federal funding for the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) Program to assist states and cities in expanding local investment in zero carbon construction projects.
This plan to reach zero carbon in all new buildings will be accompanied by additional proposals to address climate pollution from millions of existing buildings.
This is our moment to defeat climate change and to build our clean energy future.
The Valero refinery in Benicia. (Craig Miller/KQED)
Valero says it’s facing $342,000 or more in fines from county and regional agencies after a major air pollution incident earlier this year at its Benicia refinery.
In a filing last week with the federal Securities and Exchange Commission, the company says it expects to face $242,840 in proposed penalties from the Solano County Department of Resource Management and at least another $100,000 in fines to settle a dozen notices of violation from the Bay Area Air Quality Management District.
The reported penalty amount is about 1/100th of 1% of the San Antonio, Texas-based company’s reported adjusted net profit for 2018 — $3.2 billion.
“While it is not possible to predict the outcome of the following environmental proceedings, if any one or more of them were decided against us, we believe that there would be no material effect on our financial position, results of operators, or liquidity,” the company said in its filing.
The SEC document also reported a much larger penalty, $1.3 million, that Valero believes it faces in connection with an incident in the Texas city of Corpus Christi, where contaminated backflow from a company asphalt plant contaminated the area’s water supply for several days.
A local environmentalist who has followed the Benicia refinery’s recent problems said the penalties barely amount to a drop in the bucket.
“These fines don’t mean much to a giant oil company worth tens of billions of dollars,” said Hollin Kretzmann, an Oakland-based lawyer for the Center for Biological Diversity.
“It’s likely only a matter of time before we see another incident, so the communities near these dangerous refineries deserve better protection from toxic air pollution,” Kretzmann said.
Lillian Riojas, a Valero spokeswoman, said the company would not comment beyond its public filing.
Ralph Borrmann, a spokesman for the BAAQMD, emphasized that the Valero fines were not settled yet.
The district tends to spend several years negotiating settlements with local refineries, bringing together a handful of violations into a package long after they are the subject of media coverage.
For instance, the district announced in March that Shell had agreed to pay $165,000 to settle violations at its Martinez refinery that took place in 2015 and 2016.
Solano County’s investigation into Valero’s most recent incident is ongoing, according to Terry Schmidtbauer, the county’s assistant director of resource management, who emphasized that the agency has yet to produce or negotiate any final violations in connection with Valero’s March releases.
But Schmidtbauer said it was typical for his department to discuss tentative findings and potential penalties with companies it’s investigating, talks he said would be preliminary.
Two refinery components — a processing unit called a fluid coker, which heats up and “cracks” the thickest and heaviest components of crude oil, and a flue gas scrubber, which is supposed to remove fine particles before they’re released from the facility’s smokestacks — are under scrutiny in Solano County’s probe.
They began malfunctioning on March 11, resulting in the release of sooty smoke from the refinery. The releases intensified two weeks later when the facility belched out a large amount of black soot, leading to elevated levels of particulate matter.
The smoke prompted county officials to issue a health advisory for those with respiratory problems. Refinery managers shut down the facility.
The resumption of operations at the facility coincided with a slow and very small drop in gas prices, after two months of increases. On March 24, the day Valero shutdown, the average cost of a gallon of unleaded gasoline in California was $3.49, according to AAA.
On May 7, as the Benicia refinery gradually got back on-line, the the average price was $4.10. On Tuesday, it had dipped slightly to $4.07
Energy experts have said Valero’s shutdown coupled with other refinery problems in California and the high cost of crude oil globally led to the state’s recent gas price hikes, which are currently the subject of a state Energy Commission investigation.
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