Biden's Climate Initiatives

President Biden moved forward on initiatives to combat climate change with a slew of executive orders designed to protect the environment and slow greenhouse-gas emissions.  His latest orders place a freeze on new oil and gas leases on public lands and offshore waters,  place existing fossil-fuel development practices under review, and aims to conserve about 30 percent of all federal land and water by 2030.  President Biden's initiatives, which include buying more electric cars for the government's auto fleet, are also meant to create more jobs in clean energy to replace and offset jobs in the fossil-fuel businesses.  But the emphasis on jobs didn't stop Republicans from criticizing he plans, as they remain on the side of greedy polluters and will stop at nothing to reverse all of this if the win back the White House in 2024.

These are all first steps, and the Biden administration hopes to get more done through legislation. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer is dead set on pushing pro-climate bills through the evenly divided Senate by any means necessary . . . even if means having to cut a deal with a certain senator from a coal-mining state.  (I'm talking about West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin.)  As bad as coal is, though, getting off oil will be harder, as it's used to heat homes and power cars.  

Speaking of the latter, if we need cars powered by internal-combustion engines in the short term, now would be the time to at least break our addiction to larger vehicles.  I'm hoping that, despite the politically dangerous consequences involved, the Biden administration can raise the price of gas even as it promotes electric vehicles to get sport utility vehicles off the road once and for all.  And we should also discourage large wagons powered by electricity as well; whether fueled by gasoline or electricity, all SUVs are bulky and cumbersome, making highway travel less safe with their size and their height, and they waste the resources needed to make them, which could be better employed making smaller vehicles.

And if the Biden administration lets gas prices go up be desubsidizing the oil industry to promote electric vehicles, maybe we'll start driving more conventional subcompacts, like this one.

I'm up! with that! 😉