How the U.S. could tackle climate change
Breaking down five of the most influential national climate policy plans
Thinking about how to fight climate change is, to say the least, overwhelming. For most of us (myself included), it’s hard to know where to begin thinking about such a massive issue.
Luckily, lots of smart people have been thinking about it; and to get a better fundamental understanding of how experts are approaching it, I analyzed five of the most influential national climate policy plans: Biden’s, Warren’s, Sanders’, and Buttigieg’s climate policy platforms, as well as the original Green New Deal legislation led by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
At the core, I found the policy ideas in all of these proposals were aimed at accomplishing just five key things:
Define, enforce, and measure what we need to accomplish
Create enforceable, measurable goals for what we need to accomplish to avoid the worst consequences of climate change.
End our dependence on fossil fuels
Transition our world to where a carbon free lifestyle is the cheapest, easiest, and most appealing option. This section is by far the most complex, and I’ve detailed it in another post that you can read here.
Ensure job transitions
Make sure that people who used to have jobs requiring fossil fuels can move to jobs that don’t.
Protect against already unavoidable consequences of climate change
Prepare to deal with the effects of climate change that are already unavoidable, focusing on at-risk and disadvantaged populations.
Create sources of funding
Explore ways to pay for the costs of this plan.
Accomplishing any of these is far from easy. But these objectives enumerate what needs to get done.
What‘s actually going to get done though is uncomfortably dependent on the 2020 presidential and congressional elections. Assuming compromises need to be made, keeping these five objectives in mind can help us balance tradeoffs to ensure all five objectives are still addressed while allowing for the reality that some policy ideas are more politically viable than others.
Additionally, these five objectives provide a structure that can help direct the high level of passion and myriad of new ideas surrounding climate change toward accomplishing these more specific goals.
For those that want to see what ideas have already been proposed in each of these areas (and by whom), below I’ve organized the detailed policies and ideas from the five policy plans I reviewed under this framework.
Define, enforce, and measure what we need to accomplish
Create enforceable, measurable goals for what we need to accomplish to avoid the worst consequences of climate change.
Set high level targets
- 100% net zero emissions by 2050 [Sanders, Biden, Warren, Buttigieg, Green New Deal]
- 100% net zero emissions for transportation by 2030 [Sanders, Warren] or 2035 [Buttigieg]
- 100% net zero emissions for all heavy duty shipping by 2040 [Buttigieg]
- 100% net zero emission electricity generation by 2030 [Sanders], 2035 [Warren, Buttigieg]
- 100% net zero emissions for all new commercial and residential buildings by 2028 [Warren]
- 100% net zero emissions industry including steel, concrete, manufacturing, and agriculture by 2050 [Buttigieg]
Upgrade standards
- Industrial manufacturing: Create clean industrial manufacturing standards and modernize manufacturing technology. [Biden, Buttigieg, Green New Deal]
- Electricity: Create a federal clean electricity standard, which requires a certain percentage of retail energy sales to come from eligible renewable or clean sources. [Buttigieg, Sanders, Warren]
- Fuel: Set more aggressive fuel standards with the ultimate intention of transitioning to 100% electric vehicles. [Biden, Buttigieg, Warren]
- Water: Increase and enforce water quality standards. [Warren]
- Buildings: Stronger standards for household appliances and building efficiency. [Biden, Warren]
- Food: Strengthen organic standards and other food. [Sanders]
- Aviation & shipping: Create enforceable agreements to reduce emissions in aviation and shipping over time. [Biden, Buttigieg]
Create climate evaluations & reports
Create an annual federal report on the risks and impacts of climate change, including water scarcity, increased risk of conflict, state fragility, etc. [Sanders, Biden]
Require environmental impact reviews
Make new infrastructure projects and permitting decisions subject to environmental impact reviews. [Biden, Warren, Green New Deal] The EPA could also provide climate scores for all future legislation. [Sanders]
Rejoin Paris Climate Agreement
Demonstrate a commitment to the international standards set to address climate change. [Buttigieg, Sanders, Biden, Warren]
Convene and lead International summits and councils
Create additional forums to internationally discuss goals for climate related issues by convening a world climate summit and revitalize leadership in the Arctic Council. [Biden, Buttigieg]
End our dependence on fossil fuels
Transition our world to where a carbon free lifestyle is the cheapest, easiest, and most appealing option. This step is complex enough that I broke it out into several smaller steps:
Six steps to make living without fossil fuels the easiest option
- Increase the supply of renewable energy sources
- Develop technology to make carbon-free choices cheaper
- Upgrade and replace old infrastructure
- Make it harder to make money using fossil fuels
- Make it easier to make money using sustainable practices
- Encourage use of and connection to the outdoors
Note: There was so much in this section I broke out the policy ideas into a separate post. Read it here.
Ensure job transitions
Make sure that people who used to have jobs requiring fossil fuels can move to jobs that are carbon free.
Provide transition assistance and protection
Provide transition assistance for workers and communities dependent on the fossil fuel industry. This support could come in many forms, such as:
- New job creation and retraining [Biden, Sanders, Warren, Buttigieg, Green New Deal]
- Guaranteed wage and benefit parity [Sanders,Warren, Green New Deal]
- Relocation assistance [Sanders]
- Continued pension benefits [Sanders]
- Union and other worker protections [Biden, Sanders, Warren, Buttigieg, Green New Deal]
- College education [Sanders]
- Healthcare access [Sanders, Buttigieg, Green New Deal]
- Tax credits to companies hiring transitioning workers. [Sanders]
Re-create Civilian Conservation Corps
Create a modern Civilian Conservation Corps to create jobs focused on necessary conservation work. [Sanders, Buttigieg, Warren]
Support small farmers
Help farmers diversify income and make better wages through ensuring small farmer rights and facilitating the adoption of clean energy harvesting. [Sanders]
Protect against already unavoidable consequences of climate change
Prepare to deal with the effects of climate change that are already unavoidable, focusing on at-risk populations.
Create incentives for resilience investment
Create incentives for communities and local governments to prepare for disasters. This could take the form of lowering insurance premiums for people who invest in resilience, revising zoning and building codes to make buildings more resilient, and creating tax incentives not to build in highly disaster prone areas. [Biden, Buttigieg]
Create Regional Resilience Hubs
Provide climate data for each region to help communities understand and manage their risk. [Buttigieg]
Increase resilience and response funding
Increase federal funding for disaster response, such as FEMA, fire fighting, flood events, and pre-disaster mitigation. [Sanders, Buttigieg, Warren, Green New Deal]
Establish disaster insurance
Establish National Catastrophic Extreme Weather Insurance. [Buttigieg]
Retrofit government facilities for climate resilience
Ensure all federal government facilities, including our bases and military infrastructure, are resilient to extreme weather and climate changes. [Buttigieg, Sanders, Biden, Warren]
Increase critical material security
Make efforts to ensure America is not entirely dependent on imports for critical materials such as Lithium through research of alternatives, larger stores, better recycling, and diversified supply chain. [Buttigieg]
Ensure equitable relief and recovery
Ensure that at-risk populations are prioritized in disaster response and that they can return home after disasters. [Sanders, Warren, Buttigieg]
Create sources of funding
Explore ways to pay for the costs of this plan.
Before exploring the funding proposals, here’s a short summary of what each candidate estimates their plan would cost in terms of federal investment. These estimates do not include state, local, and private investment.
Cost estimates
- Sanders: $16.3 trillion
- Buttigieg: $1.5–2 trillion
- Biden: $1.7 trillion
- Warren: $3 trillion
Sell climate bonds
Sell U.S. Treasury bonds to raise money to address climate change. [Sanders, Buttigieg]
Reverse Trump tax cuts
Undo the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 to raise funds for reducing climate change. [Warren]
Raise corporate taxes
Raise taxes on large corporations. The Real Corporate Profits Tax proposes a 7% tax on profits over 100 million. Additional taxes could apply to carbon emissions. [Warren]
Tax, fine, and end subsidies for fossil fuel industry
Force the fossil fuel industry to pay more to cover the costs of its pollution, as well as ending subsidies.These measures would operate both to generate revenue and create negative incentives for pollution. [Sanders]
Reap income tax on newly created jobs
Economic and infrastructure transition to a clean economy will create large numbers of new jobs (Sanders estimates 20 million new jobs). Income tax from these jobs will raise money. [Sanders]
Save from reduced safety net
The creation of more well-paying jobs should stabilize more middle to low income families and reduce the need for safety net spending. [Sanders]
Reduce military spending
Reduction of international dependence on oil should reduce strategic need for the defense of oil assets, allowing the United States to reduce military spending. [Sanders]
Sell clean energy
Wholesale clean energy production from the Power Marketing Authorities will raise money. [Sanders]
Tax extreme wealth
Increase taxes on the extremely wealthy. Estimated by the Sanders campaign to raise 4.35 trillion dollars over the next decade. [Sanders]
Sources
Buttigieg: Buttigieg, Pete. “Mobilizing America: Rising to the Climate Challenge.” Pete for America
Biden: Biden, Joe. “Joe’s Plan for a Clean Energy Revolution and Environmental Justice.” Joe Biden
Green New Deal: Ocasio-Cortez, Alexandria, “H. RES. 109: Recognizing the duty of the Federal Government to create a Green New Deal.” Congress
Sanders: Sanders, Bernie. “The Green New Deal.” Bernie Sanders
Warren 1: Warren, Elizabeth. “100% Clean Energy for America.” Elizabeth Warren
Warren 2: Warren, Elizabeth. “Accelerating the Transition to Clean Energy.” Elizabeth Warren
Warren 3: Warren, Elizabeth. “Tackling the Climate Crisis Head On.” Elizabeth Warren
Warren 4: Warren, Elizabeth. “Leading in Green Manufacturing.” Elizabeth Warren
Warren 5: Warren, Elizabeth. “Our Military Can Help Lead The Fight In Combating Climate Change.” Elizabeth Warren
Warren 6: Warren, Elizabeth. “Protecting Our Public Lands.” Elizabeth Warren
Warren 7: Warren, Elizabeth. “Fighting for Justice as We Combat the Climate Crisis.” Elizabeth Warren
“About LWCF.” The Land and Water Conservation Fund
Earle, Geoff. “Pete Buttigieg says Nuclear Energy ‘Has a Place’ as He Addresses Climate Summit.” Daily Mail Online, 5 Feb. 2020
Siegel, Josh. “‘We Need to Keep Some’: Warren Backtracks on Nuclear Power Plants.” Washington Examiner, 20 Dec. 2019
“What Is Deferred Maintenance?” National Parks Service, U.S. Department of the Interior
Diehl, Adam. “Why Is Energy Storage Such an Important Part of the Renewables Mix.” CivicSolar, Inc., 2015
Irfan, Umair. “A Guide to how 2020 Democrats Plan to Fight Climate Change.” Vox. 2019
Warren, Elizabeth. “I’m proposing a big new idea: the Real Corporate Profits Tax.” Team Warren, Medium
Sanders, Bernie. “Tax on Extreme Wealth.” Bernie Sanders
