Tag: Obama

Obama’s new pathways for power

Barack Obama is matching his words with action. Four days after his MIT speech on renewable energy he has announced, under the Recovery Act,  $3.4 billion in grants to improve the US electricity grid. The grants go to 100 partners with plans to install smart grid technologies in their area. The government money will be matched by industry funding for a total public-private investment worth over $8 billion.

The announcement was made in a speech at Arcadia, Florida, where he was visiting a solar energy centre to open a large-scale solar power plant. In a vigorous statement he explained why the improvement is necessary and what it will accomplish. Continue reading “Obama’s new pathways for power”

Obama to UN: Let’s do it

ObamaObama’s speech at the UN yesterday may have disappointed some commentators who were looking for more specifics for progress than he provided, but from another perspective it was a most notable occasion. The world’s leading politician, speaking in a global forum, was unequivocal about the seriousness of the issue of climate change:

That so many of us are here today is a recognition that the threat from climate change is serious, it is urgent, and it is growing.  Our generation’s response to this challenge will be judged by history, for if we fail to meet it – boldly, swiftly, and together – we risk consigning future generations to an irreversible catastrophe.

No nation, however large or small, wealthy or poor, can escape the impact of climate change.  Rising sea levels threaten every coastline.  More powerful storms and floods threaten every continent.  More frequent drought and crop failures breed hunger and conflict in places where hunger and conflict already thrive.  On shrinking islands, families are already being forced to flee their homes as climate refugees.  The security and stability of each nation and all peoples – our prosperity, our health, our safety – are in jeopardy.  And the time we have to reverse this tide is running out.

But he affirmed that we can achieve this reversal. Acknowledging the slowness of mankind to respond to or even recognise the magnitude of the threat, in which the US has shared, he proclaimed a new era, evidencing the fact that the United States has done more to promote clean energy and reduce carbon pollution in the last eight months than at any other time in its history.

He then went on to list what the US government was planning.

We’re making our government’s largest ever investment in renewable energy – an investment aimed at doubling the generating capacity from wind and other renewable resources in three years.  Across America, entrepreneurs are constructing wind turbines and solar panels and batteries for hybrid cars with the help of loan guarantees and tax credits – projects that are creating new jobs and new industries.  We’re investing billions to cut energy waste in our homes, buildings, and appliances – helping American families save money on energy bills in the process.  We’ve proposed the very first national policy aimed at both increasing fuel economy and reducing greenhouse gas pollution for all new cars and trucks – a standard that will also save consumers money and our nation oil.  We’re moving forward with our nation’s first offshore wind energy projects.  We’re investing billions to capture carbon pollution so that we can clean up our coal plants.  Just this week, we announced that for the first time ever, we’ll begin tracking how much greenhouse gas pollution is being emitted throughout the country.  Later this week, I will work with my colleagues at the G20 to phase out fossil fuel subsidies so that we can better address our climate challenge. And already, we know that the recent drop in overall U.S. emissions is due in part to steps that promote greater efficiency and greater use of renewable energy.

This last sentence bears out Lester Brown’s claim that the reduction in US emissions was not all down to the recession.  The announcements about tracking greenhouse gas pollution and working with the G20 to phase out fossil fuel subsidies are new developments.  The G20 includes Saudi Arabia.

Obama then went on to point to the most important US development of all, the energy and climate bill “that would finally make clean energy the profitable kind of energy for American businesses and dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions”. It has already passed in the House of Representatives and he spoke of his intention to engage with Senate committees as the bill progressed there.

Moving on to the international scene he spoke of US actions to engage with other nations:

Because no one nation can meet this challenge alone, the United States has also engaged more allies and partners in finding a solution than ever before.  In April, we convened the first of what have now been six meetings of the Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate here in the United States.  In Trinidad, I proposed an Energy and Climate Partnership for the Americas.  We’ve worked through the World Bank to promote renewable energy projects and technologies in the developing world.  And we have put climate at the top of our diplomatic agenda when it comes to our relationships with countries from China to Brazil; India to Mexico; Africa to Europe.

His summation at this point justifiably used the word historic:

Taken together, these steps represent an historic recognition on behalf of the American people and their government.  We understand the gravity of the climate threat.  We are determined to act.  And we will meet our responsibility to future generations.

Then on to the hard part ahead:

But though many of our nations have taken bold actions and share in this determination, we did not come here today to celebrate progress.  We came because there is so much more progress to be made.  We came because there is so much more work to be done.

It won’t be easy and the difficulties are compounded by the global recession

The developed countries that have caused much of the climate damage to the present have a responsibility to lead. But the rapidly-growing developing nations that will produce nearly all the growth in global carbon emissions in the decades ahead must do their part as well. He acknowledged that some of them have already made great strides with the development and deployment of clean energy.

We cannot meet this challenge unless all the largest emitters of greenhouse gas pollution act together.  There is no other way.

He differentiated the other poorer and most vulnerable developing nations and their need to be put on the path to sustainable growth. They don’t have the resources of nations like the US or China, but they have the most immediate stake in a solution.

For these are the nations that are already living with the unfolding effects of a warming planet – famine and drought; disappearing coastal villages and the conflict that arises from scarce resources.  Their future is no longer a choice between a growing economy and a cleaner planet, because their survival depends on both.  It will do little good to alleviate poverty if you can no longer harvest your crops or find drinkable water.

That is why we have a responsibility to provide the financial and technical assistance needed to help these nations adapt to the impacts of climate change and pursue low-carbon development.

No argument with Oxfam here.

So where does the world now stand?

As we meet here today, the good news is that after too many years of inaction and denial, there is finally widespread recognition of the urgency of the challenge before us.  We know what needs to be done.  We know that our planet’s future depends on a global commitment to permanently reduce greenhouse gas pollution.  We know that if we put the right rules and incentives in place, we will unleash the creative power of our best scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs to build a better world. And so many nations have already taken the first steps on the journey towards that goal.

And a final summons to sustained effort:

But the journey is long.  The journey is hard.  And we don’t have much time left to make it.  It is a journey that will require each of us to persevere through setback, and fight for every inch of progress, even when it comes in fits and starts. So let us begin. For if we are flexible and pragmatic; if we can resolve to work tirelessly in common effort, then we will achieve our common purpose:  a world that is safer, cleaner, and healthier than the one we found; and a future that is worthy of our children.

Yes, it’s rhetoric. But it’s without precedent. It’s committed and definite. It carries with it a logic that demands expression in concrete effective measures. It acknowledges the political difficulties but asserts they must be overcome.  I think we may take comfort and courage from it.  It looks like David Orr’s transformational leadership to me.

Down to the Wire

Down to the Wire Confronting Climate Collapse

“My subject is hope of the millennial kind.” So writes David Orr in his new book Down to the Wire: Confronting Climate Collapse. The challenges ahead are more difficult than the public is led to believe and than most leadership apparently understands.  There is a long emergency for us to get through -– E.O.Wilson’s “bottleneck” –- and the hope that he discerns is at a farther horizon.

Which doesn’t mean that action can be delayed. Orr, professor of environmental studies and politics at Oberlin College, is himself a strong proponent of action. He was part of the team who over a period of two years prepared recommendations for climate change action in the first 100 days of President Obama’s administration in a plan describing over 300 actions the president could take and including a legal analysis of the executive authority at his disposal. He describes this book as a companion of sorts to that project.

However, much in the book focuses on the longer haul and includes the wider environmental degradation of which climate change is the most important part.  One striking chapter describes his shocked viewing of the devastation wrought by coal-mining in the Appalachian mountains. It’s a sickening picture: “…mountaintop removal is destroying one of the most diverse and beautiful ecosystems in the world, rendering it uninhabitable forever.” It’s not surprising that this chapter includes a plug for what Spanish philosopher Unamuno called “the tragic sense of life”, a sober philosophy which among other things is free from the delusion that humans should be about “the effecting of all things possible” or that science should “put nature on the rack and torture secrets out of her”.

Sustainability will need to be built on something deeper than the application of more technology and smarter economics.  They may only compound our tribulations. He considers that the effort to secure a decent human future will need awareness of the connections that bind us to each other, to all life, and to all life to come. What is given must be passed on.  Every culture that approaches sustainability grasps the truth that nothing can be held or possessed. Substantial sections of the book explore such ideas thoughtfully and in highly readable prose. Philosophy, ethics, and to some extent religion underlie the diagnoses and prescriptions proposed.

What constitutes the long emergency? Orr’s book focuses on the U.S. but has high relevance for the rest of us. He names five converging challenges.  First, climate change driven by the combustion of fossil fuels and land management changes. Second, nasty surprises caused by the breakdown of ecosystems and the ecological services they provide. Third, peak oil and the failure to move to energy efficiency and renewable energy sources. Fourth, exorbitant military expenditure which buys little safety or security. Fifth, the necessity to reform an economy built on excess, debt, and dishonest bookkeeping. He notes that to these can be added continued population growth, emerging diseases amplified by warming temperatures, and the arcane complexities of global economic and financial interdependence.

The implications for the U.S. are becoming clear.  The top priority is to reduce U.S. CO2 emissions by 90% by 2050 and lead the global effort to hold the temperature rise to no more than 2 degrees. Energy efficiency measures and a strong move to renewable sources are the pathway to this.  A second implication is that governments must learn to handle an economy in which quantitative growth will slow and eventually stop. Orr frequently refers to the work of ecological economists such as Herman Daly.  A limited growth economy will require more attention to the challenge of distributing wealth fairly. He points to two further implications which may  startle American readers: preparing measures to relocate internally displaced people as the effects of warming and sea level rise begin to bite; and preparing, even in the US “to deal with the ancient scourge of famine.” All these measures point to the need for a coalition to change US politics, economy, and manner of living to fit bio-physical realities.

It is not surprising that Orr advocates transformational leadership. That is, leadership which will prepare the public to understand the scale and duration of climate destabilisation and to grasp that it is a challenge to the US system of politics and governance; leadership which will help people understand the connections between energy choices and ecological consequences; leadership which will be honest in the vision of the future and lay the foundation for authentic hope.  His indictment of the leadership of the Bush-Cheney administration, which did none of those things, is succinct, comprehensive and damning.

Orr doesn’t buy the idea that the public can handle only happy news. The public should be treated as intelligent adults who are capable of understanding the truth and acting creatively and courageously in the face of necessity. Wise transformational leadership will summon the people with all of their flaws to a level of extraordinary achievement appropriate to an extraordinarily dangerous time. Lincoln, Roosevelt and Churchill figure in his discussions.

The grounds for hope are not strong right now but he’s prepared to discern them a century or more ahead. The immediate steps are clear: preserve soil and forests, save species, use less, deploy solar technologies; on the political side, “throw the rascals out”, demand accountability, elect leaders with courage and intelligence to lead in the right direction. Might we still avert catastrophe?  In a sea of wishful thinking, evasion and half measures it’s not easy to be confident. In an extended passage he discusses what in us might enhance our long-term prospects. After looking at our limitations, at the risk of sounding naïve he lists examples of not uncommon traits of character, like sociability and kindness, which will serve us, as also will our affinity for life – what E.O. Wilson calls “biophilia”.  If public awareness of the crisis really is dawning, as he hopes, much will depend on how we make four fundamental changes:  the improvement of societal resilience by reshaping the way we provision ourselves with food, energy, water, and economic support; a shift in education methods so that learning is relative to the biosphere and ecological awareness; the recalibration of governance to the way the world works as a physical system; finally, and perhaps oddly to some readers, a revolution in kindness and generosity of spirit that allows us to gracefully forgive and be forgiven. It is worth noting here that Orr is very committed to the Gandhian principle of non-violence.

Although Orr has many excursions into reflections on what makes us human and how we fit into the web of life there is no mistaking the urgency of his practical advocacy.  He knows the times are critical. Throughout the book he displays full and detailed awareness of the danger in which we already stand.  But climate change, he says, is not so much a problem to be fixed but rather a steadily worsening condition with which we must contend for a long time to come.  Improved technology may buy us time, but what we most need is a more durable and decent civilisation.

Prescott presses climate case

Prescott Tony Blair is not the only former UK Labour Party leader to seek to influence the direction of the climate change talks.  John Prescott, former Deputy Prime Minister, is deeply involved in trying to secure a successor to Kyoto.  A Guardian article reports on his efforts and his views, both of which I found heartening.

Continue reading “Prescott presses climate case”

Walking the Green talk

leipold-interviewWatching Stephen Sackur’s BBC Hard Talk interview with the retiring head of Greenpeace this week I was reminded of why I feel thankful that Greenpeace campaigns so hard and so persistently on climate change.  The adversarial style of Hard Talk often grates, and it certainly did when Sackur accused Gerd Leipold of alarmism and even managed to manufacture the impression that Greenpeace claims that the whole Greenland ice sheet will have melted by 2030.  Leipold refused to be sidetracked into defending the organisation against silly accusations, but held the line on the seriousness of the science and the need for political responses to be adequate to the science. Half measures won’t work.

Continue reading “Walking the Green talk”