Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Dems address climate change with new plan
WASHINGTON — Democrats in the House and Senate are calling for a Green New Deal intended to transform the U.S. economy to combat climate change and create thousands of jobs in renewable energy.
Freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, of New York, is teaming up with veteran Sen. Ed Markey, of Massachusetts, on the plan, which aims to eliminate the U.S. carbon footprint by 2030.
Several Democratic presidential hopefuls have embraced the idea of a Green New Deal without saying exactly what it means.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, also of Massachusetts, tweeted Thursday that she was proud to join OcasioCortez and Markey “on a #GreenNewDeal resolution to fight for our planet and our kids’ futures.”
A joint resolution drafted by Ocasio-Cortez and Markey sets a goal to meet “100 percent of the power demand in the United States through
clean, renewable and zeroemission energy sources,” including dramatic increases in wind and solar power.
While setting lofty goals, the plan does not explicitly call for eliminating the use of fossil fuels, a nod to pragmatism that may disappoint some of OcasioCortez’s strongest supporters.
Even so, their Green New Deal goes far beyond the Clean Power Plan proposed by President Barack Obama. President Donald Trump has scrapped Obama’s plan, which imposed emissions limits on coalfired power plants, as a job-killer.
The Democrats are likely to meet resistance to their proposal in Congress, especially in the Republicancontrolled Senate. Trump, who has expressed doubts about climate change, also is likely to oppose it.
The announcement of the deal came as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tapped eight Democrats to serve on a special committee to address climate change. Pelosi said she hadn’t seen the Green New Deal proposal but welcomes
“the enthusiasm” of its backers.
The resolution marks the first time lawmakers have attached legislative language to the Green New Deal, a concept that until now has been largely undefined other than as a call for urgent action to head off catastrophic climate change and create jobs.
Ocasio-Cortez said in a statement that the plan will create “unprecedented levels of prosperity and wealth for all while ensuring economic and environmental justice and security.” She calls for a “World War II-scale mobilization” that includes high-quality education and health care, clean air and water and safe, affordable housing.
Of critics who call the plan unrealistic, OcasioCortez has said when President John F. Kennedy wanted to go to the moon by the end of the 1960s, “people said it was impossible.” She also has cited Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society and the interstate highway system begun under Dwight D. Eisenhower as examples of American know-how.