It’s been a busy year for global warming skeptics, as global leaders from Pope Francis to Xi Jinping, the President of China, have come out with proposals to halt climate change. Now, President Obama has rolled out new guidelines of his own to help solve the potential crisis.
Obama’s plan, announced in a speech on Monday, is an ambitious redrawing of earlier proposals by the EPA announced in 2012 and 2014. Under the new plan, Obama seeks to roll back U.S. carbon dioxide production by 32 percent from 2015 levels by 2030. Some critics have responded that Obama has finally overstepped his legal bounds as chief executive and they have already announced plans to challenge his proposal in court.
What’s Going On?
Obama isn’t the first major American politician to take on climate change this year. Hillary Clinton unveiled a plan of her own in July that would have the United States meeting 100% of its energy needs through renewable energy and increase the number of solar panels to more than half a billion five. Her opponents Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley would take her plan one step further, outwardly opposing the Keystone pipeline and, in O’Malley’s case, taking a stand against Arctic drilling and seeking to create jobs through clean energy investments.
Obama’s proposal contains three provisions to combat global warming. The first sets emission targets of a 32 percent reduction from 2005 levels by 2030, but does not tell states and power companies how to meet them. The second requires all new power plants to produce half of the pollution that today’s plants currently produce. And the third requires states to draft a plan to meet the new standards by 2016 and have a final plan ready by 2018.
Obama derives his authority on climate change from a provision of the Clean Air Act that says the EPA “must regulate” a pollutant that poses a danger to human health and well-being. Since the Supreme Court ruled in 2007 that carbon dioxide in large quantities poses a danger by contributing to climate change, the Obama administration is on less shaky legal ground than you might immediately think.
The Reaction
First things first: the United States, on it’s own, can’t stop global warming. What legislation like this does is show the rest of the world that the United States, who is among the largest producers of carbon dioxide per capita, is serious about making some real changes moving forward.
Doing so is especially important now, as the president is gearing up to attend a Paris summit on climate change in December. Showing up with a progressive proposal to the problem in-hand would increase the likelihood of (1) being taken seriously and (2) walking away with a stronger international solution. That’s big: among the other attendees in Paris will be the countries who produce up to 70 percent of the world’s greenhouse gasses.
Of course, the president isn’t without his critics. In addition to the legal opposition being assembled by the attorneys general from 15 different states, Obama is going to have to contend with states like West Virginia and Kentucky whose economies rely heavily on coal mining. While it’s unlikely that a legislative challenge will nullify the proposal, it’ll likely be held up in court until at least 2017, delaying its implementation for at least a few more years.
Furthermore, if a Republican is elected in 2016, he or she is likely to kill the new standards. “It’ll be like a buzzsaw on the nation’s economy,” said Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin. Added Jeb(!) Bush on Sunday, “I believe it’s unconstitutional, and, I think, in a relatively short period of time, the courts will determine that as well.”
Opponents in the president’s own party have also taken aim at the new standards, albeit for different reasons. Hillary Clinton unveiled a plan of her own in July that would have the United States meeting 100% of its energy needs through renewable energy and increase the number of solar panels to more than half a billion.
Her opponents Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley would take her plan one step further, outwardly opposing the Keystone pipeline and, in O’Malley’s case, taking a stand against Arctic drilling and seeking to create jobs through clean energy investments.
“We can, and should, do much more,” writes Eric Holthaus on Slate, suggesting that President Obama also work with Republicans to pass a carbon tax in addition to his proposed rules.
How Should I Feel About This?
If you don’t believe that the world is warming thanks to human intervention, then you probably haven’t read this far anyhow. If, however, you believe that either (a) humans are directly responsible for climate change or (b) that’s it’s probably a good idea, regardless of the science, to stop pumping stuff into the air, then this might actually not be the worst idea in the world.
Don’t jump to the comment section just yet. Here’s why:
Obama’s proposal certainly seems extreme to some, especially, as I wrote before, those who have a stake in keeping coal power plants operating at full capacity and growing. It’s obviously going to shock the economies of West Virginia and Kentucky.
But it’s possible that coal was on the way out anyhow. On the same day that Obama announced his regulatory initiative, Alpha Natural Resources, once one of the largest coal producers in the United States, filed for bankruptcy protection. Falling natural gas prices, cheapening renewable energy and falling demand for electricity are all already exerting pressure on the coal industry. Alpha is the seventh coal company to go bankrupt in the past year – and The Energy Department predicts that coal’s market share will continue to decline.
Obama’s proposal does two things really well. First, as discussed earlier, it gives the United States a leg up where it’s previously fallen short by showing that we’re willing to take responsibility for our own emissions. That’ll help us gain credibility while negotiating an international compromise with countries like China, who critics say could gain an economic advantage by not holding its industries to the same standards as we plan to.
The second is that it’s insanely flexible. Normally, EPA regulations outline specific steps that industries and producers need to take in order to reduce their environmental impact. Not so here. By allowing states to draft their own plans to meet the regulations, President Obama has left room for states to play to their own strengths. It may make sense for some parts of the country to invest in nuclear, hydroelectric or wind power, building on infrastructure already being built or playing off of geographic peculiarities that make some forms of power generation more cost-efficient.
The president’s plan also allows for states to set up a cap-and-trade system similar to the one utilized by former President George Bush (the first). Cap-and-trade allows states who cut their emissions by more than the required amount to sell the difference in emissions in a form of “credits” to those who are unable to reduce theirs as much. In doing so, regions of the country who may have more trouble adapting to the new standards can transition more slowly, saving their economies the shock that might otherwise accompany a rapid transition.
Any time a president introduces broad regulations that promise to disrupt industries, reactions are going to be swift and strong. But it’s important to take the bigger picture into account before casting judgment.
What do you think? Was coal already on the way out? Can Obama’s plan save the polar bears? Did you hate polar bears already anyway? Let us know in the comments.