Thoughts on Biden's climate proposals.

First, this is the largest climate package to be proposed by a presidential candidate in American history.

It's being tagged at $2 trillion, which is at least a number with the right sort of zeroes.

But... (thread) https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/us/politics/biden-climate-plan.html

Assuming the announced plan hews close to the work already released, we have to acknowledge that it has very serious limitations.

2/

This is core paradox of contemporary American climate policy: What is wildly ambitious by the standards of US politics is objectively not bold enough, measured against the speed & scale of change actually demanded.

As I said of the Congressional plan:
https://twitter.com/AlexSteffen/status/1280571572508450817

3/

This paradox is not Biden's fault (or that the experts, scientists and activists who've pushed plans this far).

It is the result of a decades-long program of climate denial, predatory delay and civic sabotage...

4/ https://twitter.com/AlexSteffen/status/1282099056198602752

One key problem with any set of proposals is that we know it will run into a buzzsaw—or rather a forest of buzzsaws—in the form of GOP obstruction, administrative roadblocks, judicial challenges, budget constraints, local pushback and so on and so forth.

5/

It's unlikely that this set of proposals will march through the process unscathed; that (even in a landslide election year, if this is one) they'll be enacted as proposed, or that they'll be implemented without delay.

Even administrative actions face difficulties and delay.

6/

Which is, indeed, one of the main problems we have:

Current climate politics still relies on ideas of bipartisanship, of orderly and predictable transitions, and of big-tent coalitions for incremental progress.

None of these, in the real world, works as advertised.

In the context we live in, all real sustainability work is disruptive.

It demands speed, and upheaval, and conflicts created by the loss of middle-ground approaches after decades of inaction.

It demands hard choices about industrial policy, about urban form, about climate risk.

These, in turn, demand strategies that understand the depth of the conflicts between those who benefit from the fastest possible action (most Americans) and those who benefit from inaction, or negotiated delays (high-carbon industries and the owners of brittle assets, mostly...)

This conflict between fast and slow is the core reality of climate politics, not just in America, but around the world.