Inflation Reduction Act Is A Step Forward But Climate Policy Contradictions Remain

Sustainability Inflation Reduction Act Is A Step Forward But Climate Policy Contradictions Remain Nives Dolsak and Aseem Prakash Contributor Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. We write on environmental issues, climate politics and NGOs. New! Follow this author to improve your content experience.

Got it! Jul 28, 2022, 02:45am EDT | New! Click on the conversation bubble to join the conversation Got it! Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin WASHINGTON, DC – Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) (L) talks with Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer . .

. [+] (D-NY). (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) Getty Images Yesterday Senators Schumer and Manchin reached an agreement to provide $369 billion for climate and energy projects.

Of course, many obstacles have to be overcome before this agreement, the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA), is enacted into law. While additional climate funding is helpful, particularly for the electric vehicles, solar, and wind, core questions about the speed and direction of the U. S.

climate policy remain unresolved. Specifically, while the IRA provides funding for climate projects, the Biden administration seems to have become a cheer leader for the fossil fuel industry. Thus, the depth of this administration’s commitment to pursue climate goals in the face of obstacles such as energy inflation remains unclear.

In part, the administration is responding to public pressure over rising gas prices. Opinion polls suggest that Americans still do not identify climate policy as their top policy concern. As the country plunges from one crisis to another—be it inflation, crime, guns, health care, or schooling—it seems that climate issues are not going to bubble to the top of the list.

This poses a deeper question for a climate movement: how to persuade the American public that climate change should become one of their top concerns. How Climate Hawks are Responding to the IRA Some climate hawks have welcomed the IRA. Representative Pramila Jayapal, the leader of the Congressional Progressive caucus, noted: “If it’s all true, and the language reflects what the toplines really are, it’s a huge victory for the American people.

” However, other progressives have criticized the IRA. The reason is that as a part of the IRA negotiations, the Administration has agreed to approve the 303 miles Mountain Valley pipeline to move West Virginia’s gas from its Marcellus and Utica shale basins. One noted : “streamlining permitting for natural gas pipelines and exports is not climate action, it is the opposite.

More subsidies for dirty hydrogen, carbon capture, and nuclear energy are not climate action, they are the opposite. ” Another one tweeted “we need to speed up the permitting for clean, renewable energy, but not if it also fast-tracks climate destroying fossil fuel projects. ” It remains to be seen how the IRA is received by other climate leaders, especially the ones that had written to Biden last week demanding that he declares a climate emergency MORE FOR YOU Is Carbon Capture Another Fossil Fuel Industry Con? Sustainable Fashion Wants Brands To Redefine Business Growth Trouble With Predicting Future Of Transportation Is That Today Gets In The Way Ups and Downs in Climate Policy In 2020 , decarbonization was on top of the global agenda among policymakers and business leaders .

Last year, the International Energy Agency made the case for stopping new fossil fuel drilling to limit global warming to 1. 5°C. During the 2020 election campaign, President Biden pledged to block new oil drilling on federal territory.

And COVID-19 allowed everybody to reimagine the world with less travel (transportation accounts for about one-quarter of greenhouse gas emissions). However, the Ukraine invasion and rising gas prices have changed the decarbonization politics. Fossil fuels have staged a comeback across the world.

The European Parliament has voted to classify natural gas as green energy. European countries are restarting coal plants at home and want to fund oil, gas, and coal projects in Africa and support Israel’s and Egypt’s Mediterranean gas fields. The UK is developing new gas fields in the North Sea.

China and India continue to build coal plants. The Biden Administration, which wants to be perceived as the global climate leader, is facing the same challenges and responding in similar ways. It wants to suspend the gas tax, sell oil from the strategic petroleum reserve, and open up drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska.

Biden visited Saudi Arabia last week to persuade them to pump more oil . The US is building new pipelines, gas liquefaction and storage facilities, and other infrastructure to ship natural gas across the Atlantic. In sum, while the IRA is a welcome step to fund climate and energy projects, it does not address the contradictions in Biden’s climate policy.

Eventually, deep decarbonization will be possible only if it has a popular mandate. This should be the climate movement’s focus for the 2022 mid-term Congressional elections. Nives Dolsak and Aseem Prakash Editorial Standards Print Reprints & Permissions.