President Joe Biden on Wednesday announced modest new steps to combat climate change and promised stronger action to come, saying, “This is an emergency and I’ll look at it that way.”
The president, however, stopped short of declaring a formal climate emergency, which Democrats and environmental groups have been seeking after an influential Democratic senator quashed hopes for sweeping legislation to tackle global warming. Biden hinted that such a step could be coming.
“Let me be clear: climate change is an emergency,” Biden said. He pledged to use his power as president “to translate these words into formal and official governmental action through the appropriate proclamations, executive orders, and regulatory power that a president possesses.”
When it comes to climate change, he added, “I will not take no for an answer.”
Biden delivered his pledge at a former coal-fired power plant in Massachusetts. previous Brayton Point Power Plant in Somerset, Massachusettsis moving towards offshore wind power manufacturingand Biden chose him as the embodiment of the clean energy transition he is seeking but has struggled to make in the first 18 months of his presidency.
Executive actions announced Wednesday will bolster the nation’s offshore wind industry in the Gulf of Mexico and the Southeast, in addition to spending $2.3 billion to help communities cope with high temperatures through programs administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Department of Health and Human Services, and other agencies.
The journey comes as Historic temperatures bake Europe and the United States. Forest fires ravaged Spain, France and Britain on Tuesday. It broke its record for the highest temperature ever registered. At least 100 million Americans will face heat advisories in the coming days as US cities sweat through more intense and longer-lasting heat waves that scientists attribute to global warming.
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calls for a declaration of national emergency to address the climate crisis have been on the rise among Democratic activists and lawmakers after the Senator. Joe ManchinD−W.Va., last week stalled talks on a long-delayed legislative package.
Biden said Wednesday that the option remains under consideration. “I’m setting traps on the totality of the authority that I have,” he told reporters after returning to Washington. “Unless Congress acts in the meantime, I can do more” on climate, he said. “Because not enough is being done right now.”
Biden said he has been told that part of his climate bill is still “up in the air,” but acknowledged he has not spoken to Manchin.
Biden Announces Modest Climate Actions; he promises more to come. #USpoli #ClimateChange
Gina McCarthy, Biden’s climate adviser, said Biden is not “shining away” from treating climate as an emergency. “The president wants to make sure that we’re doing it right, that we’re designing it, and that we have the time we need to figure this out,” she told reporters on Air Force One.
Senator ed markeyD-Mass., who attended Wednesday’s event, said he was “confident that the president is finally ready to do whatever it takes to deal with this crisis.”
Environmental groups were less hopeful. “The world is burning from California to Croatia, and right now Biden is fighting the fire with a trickle from a garden hose,” said Jean Su, director of the energy justice program at the Center for Biological Diversity.
An emergency climate declaration would allow Biden to redirect federal resources to boost renewable energy programs that would help speed the transition away from fossil fuels like coal and oil. The declaration could also be used as a legal basis to block oil and gas drilling or other projects, though such actions would likely be challenged in court by energy companies or Republican-led states.
Such a statement would be similar to that issued by Biden’s Republican predecessor, Donald Trump, who declared a national emergency to build a wall on the southern border when lawmakers refused to allocate money for that effort. Later, a federal appeals court ruled that Trump’s action was illegal.
Some legal scholars said an emergency weather order could meet a similar fate. The Supreme Court last month limited the authority of the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants that contribute to global warming.
Declaring a climate emergency “is a way to bypass Congress and Joe Manchin specifically. That’s not what emergency powers are for,” said Elizabeth Goitein, co-director of the liberty and national security program at the Brennan Center for Justice. In New York. University School of Law.
Biden pledged last week to take significant executive action on climate after months-long discussions between Manchin and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, stalled. The West Virginia senator cited stubbornly high inflation as the reason for his hesitation, though he has long protected energy interests in his coal and gas-producing state.
For now, Manchin has said he will only agree to a limited legislative deal on health care and prescription drugs. The White House has indicated that it wants Congress to accept that deal, and Biden will tackle the climate problem on his own.
Biden visited the dusty grounds of the former Brayton Point Power Station, which closed in 2017 after burning coal for more than five decades. The plant will now manufacture submarine transmission cables to bring power generated by offshore wind power to the power grid.
A few dozen people listened in the blazing sun as Biden spoke, including McCarthy, members of Congress and Biden’s climate envoy, John Kerry, a former senator from Massachusetts.
A new report says the US and other major carbon polluting nations are breaching commitments to fight climate change. Among the 10 biggest carbon emitters, only the European Union has enacted policies close to or consistent with international goals to limit warming to just a few tenths of a degree Celsius higher, scientists and experts say.
Daly reported from Washington.