Why is it that climate activists do not have the equivalent of the right wing corporate ALEC, to provide model climate legislation, regulation, and programs to state and local governments?
Thank you for your insights. Working at the local and state level is always important. However, there is a blind spot in your analysis. Our federal public lands in the West play an important role in climate mitigation and adaptation, even desert lands. Check out this report: https://suwa.org/the-role-of-americas-red-rock-wilderness-act-in-protecting-biodiversity-and-mitigating-the-climate-crisis/. Thank Senator Murray for cosponsoring the America's Red Rock Wilderness Action (S.1535) and the WA House Ds for cosponsoring the House version, (H. 3780) here: https://suwa.org/cosponsors-americas-red-rock-wilderness-act-117th-congress/. There are 30 million acres of Bureau of Land Management lands in the West that qualify as Wilderness Study Areas which would protect them from oil, gas, and mining development but have not been designated due to a 2003 Bush Administration settlement with the then Governor of Utah. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland can reverse this. We can't stop paying attention to what is happening on our federal lands no matter who is in the majority if we want to address the climate crisis.
As I have come to expect, your reasoning is insightful and well-supported. I look forward to each email notification of a new post. It is certainly true that the climate action/no action pendulum will likely swing back over 2022-24. A return to the climate advocacy trench is in the cards, raising another question: why should something so fundamentally important be subject to such whiplashing and see-sawing?
Pollution from cars gets reduced in one of three ways:
1. Less driving
2. More fuel-efficient vehicles
3. Conversion to non-carbon generating vehicles
With California’s 2002 legislation forming something of a gold standard for other states, are there ways to convert imposed restrictions into beneficial options?
Here is what I mean...
If the tailpipe solution standards imposed by California resulted in 30% less CO2 per vehicle by 2016, I am assuming that was due to technologies introduced by automobile manufacturers. Those technologies probably included cleaner emissions and greater fuel efficiency (vehicles travelling the same distance would burn less fuel). Less fuel burned means less fuel sold, a result naturally resisted by the fossil fuel producers.
Meanwhile, the auto manufacturers were successful in implementing those new technologies. Consumers were, I am sure, happy for the increased fuel efficiency. In the worst case, they were likely indifferent to the reduced emissions, unless there was a noticeable performance hit, or an appreciable purchase price increase.
And what about production costs? Having redesigned and retooled to produce vehicles conforming to California’s restrictions, what benefit would there be in reverting to the old tech? Would vehicles become cheaper to produce and to own? Certainly, the fossil fuel mavens would be thrilled, but what about the consumers? If they are now driving more fuel-efficient vehicles (producing lower emissions), how receptive would they be in going backwards?
Auto manufacturers too would be unlikely to want a reversal. They are already pumping huge money into an electric vehicles future (however protracted the conversion looks). Sure, they have long been cozy bedfellows with Fossil Flintstone
There are a lot of assumptions in what I have laid out here, but keeping consumers focussed on their self-interest seems to be the line of least resistance - even those consumers whose knee-jerk response is always to resist regulation and government interference would not welcome paying more for less.
Speaking of self-interest, greenwashing politicians flip in the wind fanned by their constituents, and the special interest who fund the campaigns (perhaps not in that order). The opposing narrative to that of the climate change resisters should be an engagement in consumer/constituent self interest. Also, if a restriction put in place by an old or previous administration has demonstrably improved the lives of the citizens, would not a removal of that restriction be an act of political (big government) interference by the in-coming opposing party?
A Closing Point
Regarding the Columbia River Bridge expansion, we should avoid undermining the benefit by conflating the problem. Increased transportation and ease of movement are arguably good things. Disregarding for a moment the environmental impact of construction, the problem (emissions) produced by increased transportation exists only so long as fossil fuels are the driver. Yes, it may well be true that an electrified future is decades away. But it should not sway us from redoubling our efforts to narrow that margin. All eyes, minds, money and resources should be trained on bringing that about.
Energy capture, distribution, storage and delivery are the biggest hurdles being overcome to leverage the work being done by auto manufacturers to design and sell affordable, efficient, and worry-free vehicles. And let us remember the responsibility we all bear in not just creating jobs in the burgeoning renewable energy industry, but that we minimize the impact being felt by the multi-generational contribution made to the fossil fuel industry. We are all in this together, and the benefits to be had are enormous.
EXCELLENT point! and what is newly true of the climate movement has been true of the overpopulation movement since the mid 1970s. The environmental contraception and abortion funding we can't possibly hope for from the feds can come first from small, urban town halls like Compton or Ferndale and then from big city halls! especially when they save so much local school tax.
Why is it that climate activists do not have the equivalent of the right wing corporate ALEC, to provide model climate legislation, regulation, and programs to state and local governments?
Thank you for your insights. Working at the local and state level is always important. However, there is a blind spot in your analysis. Our federal public lands in the West play an important role in climate mitigation and adaptation, even desert lands. Check out this report: https://suwa.org/the-role-of-americas-red-rock-wilderness-act-in-protecting-biodiversity-and-mitigating-the-climate-crisis/. Thank Senator Murray for cosponsoring the America's Red Rock Wilderness Action (S.1535) and the WA House Ds for cosponsoring the House version, (H. 3780) here: https://suwa.org/cosponsors-americas-red-rock-wilderness-act-117th-congress/. There are 30 million acres of Bureau of Land Management lands in the West that qualify as Wilderness Study Areas which would protect them from oil, gas, and mining development but have not been designated due to a 2003 Bush Administration settlement with the then Governor of Utah. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland can reverse this. We can't stop paying attention to what is happening on our federal lands no matter who is in the majority if we want to address the climate crisis.
As I have come to expect, your reasoning is insightful and well-supported. I look forward to each email notification of a new post. It is certainly true that the climate action/no action pendulum will likely swing back over 2022-24. A return to the climate advocacy trench is in the cards, raising another question: why should something so fundamentally important be subject to such whiplashing and see-sawing?
Pollution from cars gets reduced in one of three ways:
1. Less driving
2. More fuel-efficient vehicles
3. Conversion to non-carbon generating vehicles
With California’s 2002 legislation forming something of a gold standard for other states, are there ways to convert imposed restrictions into beneficial options?
Here is what I mean...
If the tailpipe solution standards imposed by California resulted in 30% less CO2 per vehicle by 2016, I am assuming that was due to technologies introduced by automobile manufacturers. Those technologies probably included cleaner emissions and greater fuel efficiency (vehicles travelling the same distance would burn less fuel). Less fuel burned means less fuel sold, a result naturally resisted by the fossil fuel producers.
Meanwhile, the auto manufacturers were successful in implementing those new technologies. Consumers were, I am sure, happy for the increased fuel efficiency. In the worst case, they were likely indifferent to the reduced emissions, unless there was a noticeable performance hit, or an appreciable purchase price increase.
And what about production costs? Having redesigned and retooled to produce vehicles conforming to California’s restrictions, what benefit would there be in reverting to the old tech? Would vehicles become cheaper to produce and to own? Certainly, the fossil fuel mavens would be thrilled, but what about the consumers? If they are now driving more fuel-efficient vehicles (producing lower emissions), how receptive would they be in going backwards?
Auto manufacturers too would be unlikely to want a reversal. They are already pumping huge money into an electric vehicles future (however protracted the conversion looks). Sure, they have long been cozy bedfellows with Fossil Flintstone
There are a lot of assumptions in what I have laid out here, but keeping consumers focussed on their self-interest seems to be the line of least resistance - even those consumers whose knee-jerk response is always to resist regulation and government interference would not welcome paying more for less.
Speaking of self-interest, greenwashing politicians flip in the wind fanned by their constituents, and the special interest who fund the campaigns (perhaps not in that order). The opposing narrative to that of the climate change resisters should be an engagement in consumer/constituent self interest. Also, if a restriction put in place by an old or previous administration has demonstrably improved the lives of the citizens, would not a removal of that restriction be an act of political (big government) interference by the in-coming opposing party?
A Closing Point
Regarding the Columbia River Bridge expansion, we should avoid undermining the benefit by conflating the problem. Increased transportation and ease of movement are arguably good things. Disregarding for a moment the environmental impact of construction, the problem (emissions) produced by increased transportation exists only so long as fossil fuels are the driver. Yes, it may well be true that an electrified future is decades away. But it should not sway us from redoubling our efforts to narrow that margin. All eyes, minds, money and resources should be trained on bringing that about.
Energy capture, distribution, storage and delivery are the biggest hurdles being overcome to leverage the work being done by auto manufacturers to design and sell affordable, efficient, and worry-free vehicles. And let us remember the responsibility we all bear in not just creating jobs in the burgeoning renewable energy industry, but that we minimize the impact being felt by the multi-generational contribution made to the fossil fuel industry. We are all in this together, and the benefits to be had are enormous.
Thank you, Patrick, for all you are doing.
EXCELLENT point! and what is newly true of the climate movement has been true of the overpopulation movement since the mid 1970s. The environmental contraception and abortion funding we can't possibly hope for from the feds can come first from small, urban town halls like Compton or Ferndale and then from big city halls! especially when they save so much local school tax.