Innovation, economic incentives, and improving the quality of life has a hard time competing these days with the juicy stuff that dominates the waves of clickbait we are destined to surf through, but when these ingredients for good government policy come together it’s important to share that knowledge to ensure no opportunity to do the right thing is missed.
The Green New Deal for Public Housing that would rehabilitate and restore housing needed to counter the shortage of apartments and homes, greatly improve livability and wellness for communities and reduce the carbon emitted from environmentally unsound dwellings. It’s also a substantial jobs bill since contractors, building architects and the rest of the building trades food chain is required to make it happen. But, chances are you didn’t hear much, if anything, about it.
The serial polluters and chronic naysayers insisted the Green New Deal was dead on arrival. The critics promisedthe sky would fall, the U.S. economy would crumble, and Americans' jobs would melt away like another glacier succumbing to the earth’s rising temperature.
The climate change deniers were entrenched, organized, and well financed with billions of industry dollars. Most in the environmental movement believed there was no chance of passing breakthrough legislation that could contain carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions.
And then President Biden and the Democrats in Congress proved the toxic fossil fuels cabal wrong, investing at least $369 billion in America’s clean and renewable energy sources over the next 10 years, and finally setting the U.S. on a course that protects the earth for generations to come.
“I will tell you there was a two-week period before it came out of nowhere being branded the Inflation Reduction Act where we all thought the bill was dead for real this time,” Leah Stokes, a political scientist at UC-Santa Barbara who studies and advocates for clean energy, recalled on PBS NewsHour. “And there was real sadness across the climate community, because folks knew this was really the last, best chance that we had to pass a climate law. So, seeing President Biden sign it (in 2022), I mean, it was just monumental.”
The pioneering Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) arms the Environmental Protection Agency with stiff penalties to use to finally go after industry villains that take a careless and cavalier poison for profit approach to the air we breathe. We are already seeing positive results.
As for the economy, job creation is through the roof, inflation is finally coming down and the recession that Fox News and right wing economists promised and prayed for never happened.
With more environmental initiatives to come, the IRA is the foundation for reaching the same goals the Green New Deal set out to achieve, but don’t just take our word for it. Take the words of Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), the authors of the Green New Deal.
“When we first introduced the Green New Deal, we were told that our vision for the future was too aspirational. Four years later, we see core tenets of the Green New Deal reflected in the Inflation Reduction Act — the largest ever federal investment in fighting climate change, with a focus on creating good, green jobs,” AOC said, vowing to build off the IRA to expand environmental policy.
It was young people and workers that drove the passage of the IRA, Markey declared.
“Thanks to the persistence of the Green New Deal movement, we succeeded in securing historic progress through the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act,” Markey said. “Now we have an obligation to honor the origins of that success – which sprung from the young people and workers who never once stopped organizing for their future – by putting those dollars to work to create dignified jobs, rectify generations of systemic injustice, and reverse climate damage.”
The comprehensive package of environmental measures in the IRA includes:
● Reducing carbon emissions by about 40 percent by 2030 by bringing online a combination of expanded renewable energy sources, including wind and solar; and replacing gas guzzlers with affordable electric vehicles incentivized through a series of lower- and middle-income tax breaks up to $7,500 for new clean vehicles and up to $4,000 for used clean vehicles.
● Increasing cleaner production by cracking down on polluters that shirk the law and allow excessive amounts of greenhouse gasses to escape into the atmosphere. The penalties, formally called a waste emissions charge, are hefty: $900 per metric ton of methane in 2024, $1,200 in 2025, and $1,500 in 2026 and thereafter. Violators get a more than fair chance to avoid the if they adhere to a schedule for fixing methane leaks, replacing faulty or outdated parts, and build in new testing for leakage.
● A whopping $60 billion for Environmental Justice programs and grants for communities and hard hit by emissions and pollution, especially where people live, work, play, and go to school, including low-income neighborhoods where people have been passed by and ignored for too long.
● Lowering energy costs for individuals up to 30 percent, or about $1,200 per year, in tax credits and rebatesfor energy-efficient home improvements, including heat pumps, cooktops, and other appliances and related electrical upgrades. Up to 30 percent in tax credits for rooftop solar, batteries, geothermal heat pumps, and related technology and equipment.
It’s obviously the biggest environmental agenda ever signed into law. Any president or Congress could stop there, but there are clear signs President Biden isn’t done yet. Late last month President Biden paused applications for new liquified natural gas export depots so the Energy Department can study the economic and environmental impact of the new facilities.
The pause "sees the climate crisis for what it is: the existential threat of our time," President Biden said.
Late last year President Biden also took executive action to create the long sought after American Climate Corps, which will place and train more than 20,000 young people for jobs in energy, conservation and the restoration of the earth.
“When we first introduced the Green New Deal there were so many cynics in our politics in Washington and beyond, saying, ‘This isn’t possible, this is too big, this is too ambitious,'” Rep. Ocasio-Cortez said of the American Climate Corps, according to E&E News. “Well, today we can say that we are starting to turn the green dream into a green reality.”
There is no question Washington is finally going green, with one catch. It all comes to an end if Trump is elected in November.
Written by Ken Bazinet, a former White House correspondent, who covered three presidents and five presidential elections. Still writing, he works with organizations and individuals that focus on opening and expanding ballot access to Black, Latino, Native American, pro-worker and rural voters.