Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
February 8, 2020 A party in labor? Although Biden lost Iowa, he won the endorsement of the 775,000-member International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) while on his way to New Hampshire. It was an unusually early endorsement for the union. In 2008 and 2016, the IBEW waited until Obama and Clinton had more or less secured the nomination. It seems Biden’s poor Iowa showing was as unnerving for the union as it was for Biden. In making the early endorsement, IBEW president Lonnie Stephenson described ‘an urgency this year’ to pick a candidate aligned with their values. Stephenson was being polite. The fact is that Sanders scares the biomass out of the IBEW and a lot of other unions, including the United Mineworkers (UMW), North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU), and the AFL-CIO and many of its more than sixty union affiliates, representing 12.5 million members. Labor’s problem with Sanders can be summed up in three words—Green New Deal (GND). Sanders’ own plan builds on the GND and calls for a ten-year, nationwide mobilization that would eliminate the nation’s carbon footprint by 2030. Workers in the oil, gas, and coal industries hear and read those words as a pink slip. Biden—being the moderate he is—speaks of making the transition by 2050.
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 Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
February 3, 2020 A Slippery Slope Over the past several weeks, I’ve included clips on the efforts of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) to bring House Republicans in from the cold on climate change. McCarthy’s change of heart is likely attributable to polling numbers that clearly indicate Republicans are vulnerable on this issue with young suburban voters. The suburbs are showing themselves as fertile Democratic fields because of changing demographics. It is also likely that stoking this newly emerged effort to come up with policy and program proposals has been the Democrats’ climate focus—both in the House and on the hustings. Every contender for the Democratic presidential nomination has made climate defense a prominent part of their pitch to primary voters—to one degree or another. Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee have just released their 600-page draft of the Climate Leadership and Environmental Action for our Nation’s Future Act. (see below) It lays out a multi-faceted plan to reach zero-net fifty greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. It’s still a work in progress. With growing support for a federal response to climate change among young suburban Republicans, McCarthy believed it was folly to continue playing the denial card. The way he phrases it “for a 28-year old, the environment is the Number 1 and Number 2 issue.” It should also be recognized that there’s already growing Republican interest and support for a carbon tax—notably the Baker-Shultz plan. There is a growing number of college-based Repub-lican chapters that are actively advocating its passage. It’s an interesting partnership between old-line establishment Republicans and new-line young Republicans.  Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
January 25, 2020 The Trump administration has gone to great pains to purge Obama-era science advisers from federal advisory boards and replace them with their own. Trump’s scientists seem to have the integrity many of his administrative appointees, e.g., EPA Administrator Wheeler lack. The administration is going to have a tough time defending its actions in court. It’s possible that administration lawyers are counting on courts deferring to agency expertise in these matters. It is equally possible that they don’t care. The hole in this strategy is that the administration’s own scientists are unwilling to validate wishful facts. In the clips below, Wheeler and Trump are both called out on their statements about what a proposed rule will and won’t do, as well when the world can expect to begin feeling the impacts of global climate change. Is it any wonder that 1,600 scientists have left government since Trump took office? Although rarely spoken of, part of Trump’s legacy will be the shambles the executive branch will be upon his departure.  Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
January 21, 2020 Impeachment continues to dominate the news in Washington. The Senate is in session and is currently debating the rules of engagement in the trial phase of Trump’s impeachment. It will be a while yet before the actual trial begins. There some contentious to be answered, e.g., will witnesses be allowed to testify? If yes, who. Will they be asked to testify in person or by video or written questions and answers. As rigged as the outcome seems to be, there’s a lot riding on the optics for both Republicans and Democrats. The full House is back next week. This week members involved in the impeachment proceedings are the ones hard at work. Tree’s company. Trump tried out a new storyline in his speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. It involved both a rejection of prophecies of doom and reforestation. “Fear and doubt is not a good thought process because this is a time for tremendous hope and joy and optimism and action…But to embrace the possibilities of tomorrow, we must reject the perennial prophets of doom and their predictions of the apocalypse,” Trump told his audience. 
Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion (#39)
January 16, 2020 Congress Rules-- Impeachment and the pending Senate trial are understandably sucking most of the oxygen out of Capital City. Senate committee chairs are still deciding if hearings are feasible once the trial starts. Rules are that Senators must sit in their seats for the entire time. They won’t be allowed their cell phones, or to talk to their neighbors, or read any material not directly asso-ciated with the proceeding. The hearings are expected to go into February. Trump will likely be giving his State of the Union address while the trial is still going on. It should be interesting to see how he will handle facing 230 of his accusers in Speaker Pelosi’s House. It appears that House Republicans are meeting to discuss putting together their own climate crisis package in response to the CLEAN Future Act that was put together by Democratic mem-bers of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. (See here for a detailed discussion) Although they won’t admit it, it does seem they are worried about having no response to the Democrats in an election year. 
Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
January 11, 2020 Talk about cooking the book(s) As anticipated, Trump announced his administration’s proposed changes to the National Envi-ronmental Policy Act (NEPA). The proposed changes would reduce the number of infra-structure projects requiring an environmental review and releasing agencies from having to account for cumulative environmental impacts. Under the proposed rules, projects paid for with private investment funds, e.g., the Keystone XL pipeline, would not require an environ-mental impact statement. Absent the NEPA requirement privately funded projects would not be required to disclose plans to discharge waste into nearby rivers, clear cut forests or otherwise increase greenhouse gas emissions. The administration has virtually eliminated federal consideration of climate change by freeing agencies from having to account for cumulative environmental impacts. The courts have generally required agencies to account for cumulative climate impact of projects like the federal government's leasing public lands for oil and gas exploration and extraction. The proposed changes are here. The changes won’t become permanent before the conclusion of a 60-day comment period and conduct of two public hearings. 
Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
January 8, 2020 Feeding off of a failed UN Summit late in 2019, the almost daily release of reports updating and confirming climate science studies, student strikes, a continent on fire, and the already prominent place of climate in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, 2020 looms as a watershed political year for national climate policy. To state the obvious, the re-election of Trump would be a devastating setback for the environ-mental well-being of the nation and the world. Almost as costly in terms of climate defense would be a divided Congress. Notwithstanding the rising number of Republicans in both the House and Senate who are now at least willing to admit there is a problem, Republicans and Democrats remain very far apart in terms of a willingness to do anything even close to what the scientists say is needed within the time they say it needs to be done. Below is a thumbnail about the new million dollar ad campaign the American Petroleum Institute (API) is launching this year on behalf of oil and gas companies. The tack the Institute is taking is to pitch themselves as part of the solution, without altering their position on most policy matters. API, for example, remains opposed to a carbon tax, the regulation of methane and other greenhouse gases. The campaign is intended to support a heavy lobbying effort by the companies to keep fracking alive.  Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
November 6, 2019 The big news of the week—kind of—was Trump’s starting the paperwork for getting the US out of the Paris Climate Accord (Accord). Although Trump announced his intentions in June 2017, the rules of the Accord prohibited any formal action before a few days ago. The US won’t actu-ally be off the Accord until November 4, 2020—a day after the next presidential election. At one level, the Accord with or without the US has not achieved what had been hoped. Only a few nation-states have upped their voluntary greenhouse gas reduction pledges to the point needed to keep global temperatures from crossing the temperature threshold the science community warns of as being points of no return. Trump’s withdrawal, however, sends the wrong message. It will be used by populist leaders in Brazil, central and eastern European nations, and elsewhere as an excuse for them to retract their country's support for the Accord. The withdrawal diminishes US standing in climate negotiations, as well as its moral leadership position—not just now but into the future. As in so many other areas, Trump’s willingness just to walk away—with no regard for what’s left in his wake—is making the US an unreliable partner. 
Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
October 27, 2019 Trump appears to have changed his mind about bringing all the troops home from Syria. It’s now anticipated that a contingent of US forces and heavy armor will be tasked with protecting Syrian oil fields. An aide close to Trump told reporters Trump’s a businessman and is even suggesting he like to make Syria’s oil a business opportunity, proposing for a U.S. oil company to partner with America’s Syrian Kurdish allies to develop the oil for export. Trump has been quoted saying in a recent cabinet meeting that if you’re going in, keep the oil, Trump said at a cabinet meeting. We’ll work something out with the Kurds so that they have some money so that they have some cash flow. Maybe we’ll get one of our big oil companies to go in and do it properly. The statements highlight just how little “the leader of the free world” understands the world. If nations around the world were using available supplies of clean energy technologies, including solar, wind, and efficiency, foreign oil fields would need far less protection. Climate policy is another thing Trump seems not to understand. Addressing an energy industry audience focused on fracking, Trump miscast the Paris climate agreement and the timing of the US’s pulling out of it. The US cannot officially withdraw from the accord until November 4, 2020—a day after the election. Trump also ran through his usual series of lies about Obama’s Clean Power Plan—calling it a disaster having a price tag of $40 billion per year. The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service in 2018 calculated that repeated analyses by the EPA showed that the benefits of the clean power plan usually outweighed the costs, at times by a lot. For instance, fewer illnesses and deaths turned into dollar amounts based on a formula on the value of each life.
 Climate, Politics/Capitol Light©, is a service of The JBS Group and Civil Notion
October 23, 2019 Land, lots of land, and water too. Democratic Sens. Tom Udall of New Mexico and Michael Bennet of Colorado have introduced a resolution calling for a national conservation goal of protecting at least 30% of the country's lands and waters by 2030. The "Thirty by Thirty Resolution to Save Nature" urges the federal government to set the conservation target to help fight climate change as well as improve access to nature for communities of color. The measure "recognizes that nature — like climate change — is reaching a tipping point," said Udall in prepared remarks for an event later this morning at the Center for American Progress that will also feature Rep. Deb Haaland (D-N.M.). "Many ecosystems and wildlife species are nearing the point of no return." The resolution recommends that the government work with local communities, states, tribes, and private landowners to increase conservation efforts to sequester carbon and greenhouse gas emissions in land and water. Democratic Sens. Dick Durbin of Illinois, Cory Booker of New Jersey, and Kamala Harris of California are co-sponsors. (E&E News)
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AuthorJoel Stronberg, MA, JD., of The JBS Group is a veteran clean energy policy analyst with over 30 years’ experience, based in Washington, DC. Archives
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