The Oneida Daily Dispatch (Oneida, NY)
Biden: ‘We can’t wait any longer’ to address climate crisis
WASHINGTON » In the most ambitious U.S. effort to stave off the worst effects of climate change, President Joe Biden issued executive orders Wednesday to cut oil, gas and coal emissions and double energy production from offshore wind turbines.
The orders target federal subsidies for oil and other fossil fuels and halt new oil and gas leases on federal lands and waters. They also aim to conserve 30 percent of the country’s lands and ocean waters in the next 10 years and move to an all-electric federal vehicle fleet.
Biden’s sweeping plan is aimed at slowing human-caused global warming, but it also carries
political risk for the president and Democrats as oiland
coal-producing states face job losses from moves to sharply increase U.S. reliance on clean energy such as wind and solar power.
“We can’t wait any longer’’ to address the climate
crisis, Biden said at the White House. “We see with our own eyes. We know it in our bones. It is time to act.’’
He said his orders will “supercharge our administration’s ambitious plan to confront the existential threat of climate change.”
Biden has set a goal of eliminating pollution from fossil fuel in the power sector by 2035 and from the U.S. economy overall by 2050, speeding what is already a market-driven growth of solar and wind energy and lessening the country’s dependence on oil and gas. The aggressive plan is aimed at slowing human-caused global warming that is magnifying extreme weather events such as deadly wildfires in the West and drenching rains and hurricanes in the East. ,
Biden acknowledged the
political risk, repeatedly stating that his approach would create jobs in the renewable energy and automotive sectors to offset any losses in oil, coal or natural gas.
“When I think of climate change and the answers to it, I think of jobs,’’ Biden said. “We’re going to put people to work. We’re not going to lose jobs. These aren’t pie-in-the-sky dreams. These are concrete actionable solutions. And we know how to do this.’’
In a change from previous administrations of both parties, Biden also is directing agencies to focus help and investment on the lowincome and minority communities that live closest to polluting refineries and other hazards, and the oiland coal-patch towns that face job losses as the U.S.
moves to sharply increase its reliance on wind, solar and other other energy sources that do not emit climate-warming
greenhouse gases.
Biden pledged to create