Dec 27, 2020
Meeting Climate Challenges
Terry H. Schwadron
Dec. 27, 2020
Joe Biden is making a lot of good noise about paying attention to the human effects on the global climate and what we need to do about it.
He has sought to match his pledges of an across-the-government approach by federal agencies, states and rule changes with appointments of a number of new Cabinet-level officials who speak the same language and seem interested in working as a team towards accomplishing goals as diverse as remaking the auto industry to shutting coal-burning utility plants to restarting international agreements with the United States in charge.
In Biden-speak, these efforts are tied as much to job-creation as to environmental rules and development of alternative energy sources.
Usually at this point, we might note that the opposition Republicans in the House and Senate present a unique set of political challenges towards getting anything done. But more fundamental may be just the extent of the job ahead. More to the point, whatever Biden does needs to be picked up and re-doubled by the administrations that follow.
In that sense, we lost four years in these efforts to Trump’s insistence on looking away from the issues.
For openers, the United States’ ability to produce electricity from natural gas, solar, bio-fuels and other sources is a key ingredient of any new mix. From all sources, it would seem that less dependency on fossil fuels means a whole lot more dependency on electricity — something that even oil and gas companies agree with, prompting their own changes in investments towards alternative fuels.
That basically scientific, mathematical reality is something we never heard uttered in the Donald Trump White House. In Trumpland, oil resources were infinite — or would last for however long he would need oil-dependent mottos to carry him through ever-expanding corporate growth and political sustenance; to Trump, wind turbines killed birds, the sun could never shine enough to drive a car, and nuclear was only an adjective used next to weapons, even if to threaten hurricane clouds.
Trump even rolled back improving mileage standards that were acceptable to automakers.
Whatever happened around the world was someone else’s problem.
How Do We Measure Success?
So, what exactly are the milestones we should be seeking from the Biden administration to determine if the efforts towards climate are serious?
The Andlinger Center of Energy and the Environment at Princeton has a recent study out that provides some of these guideposts towards achieving “net zero” pollution. In brief, it argues that the United States will need to be building a staggering amount of energy infrastructure over the next 10 years to cut greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050. They built on findings from the UN’ Sustainable Development Solutions Network.
Despite the substantial pockets of political dispute, we all know the reasons why this is important at least directionally. All the approaches the study lays out require trade-offs, whether in habit or specific current jobs or in the use of nuclear power or carbon capture technologies as well as wild expansion of alternative energy sources.
Still, “With a massive, nationwide effort the United States could reach net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050 using existing technology and at costs aligned with historical spending on energy,” according to the study.
Nevertheless, it gives us a scale of how to watch the Biden administration.
— Energy companies, on a pace to install 42 gigawatts of new wind turbine and solar panels in the next year, would need to double that pace and keep growing. The capacity of the nation’s electric grid must expand by 60 percent by 2030.
— Auto companies, already recognizing the trend, need to move quickly to support electric cars, and the government needs a plan for recharging stations and an Operation Warp Speed for battery development to shrink the size and increase durability. As a basic guide, electric car sales need to move from 2 percent now to 50 percent by 2030.
— At least a quarter of homes now heated by natural gas or oil need to move to electric heat pumps.
— All coal-burning plants, which have dwindled to about 200 nationwide, would have to shut by 2030.
— We need to build hydrogen-producing plants.
Massive Effort
You get the idea. A big part of this is persuading companies, who seem willing, to go along with a national effort.
Then, we will need a ton of investment money from the government in just the right places; scaling up electric car solutions will cost $2 or $ trillion alone.
In the past, Republicans have criticized Democrats for trying to choose winners and losers in what should be a free-market, but as we have learned through pandemic as an example, sometimes a totally independent, competitive free market is not the most appropriate route when survival is at stake. As with health care, this is something we will need to stop trying to resolve by wearing colored caps and shouting for people to be locked up.
What this involves mostly, then, is a coming together of national or international willpower.
Given the depth of our division over mask-wearing, of continuing denial despite actual contagion and 300,000 American deaths, I am not optimistic.
Building codes need to be rewritten, public transit needs expanding, certain aspects of what has come to be accepted as normal in America needs to be looked at anew. Frankly, we are not very good at this as a nation, particularly with an ever-growing penchant for public violence when things don’t go our way.
But let’s see if Biden can bring it. At least he’s expressing interest and commitment, a far cry from the guy leaving this job.
##
