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Biden Administration Rolls Back Disastrous Trump Drilling Plan for Western Arctic
Full ban on new fossil fuel leasing is still needed to protect public lands, achieve climate goals.
WASHINGTON
The Biden administration announced yesterday that it will reverse a Trump administration policy that opened up millions of acres in the Western Arctic for oil drilling.
Trump had approved a plan that would allow drilling in more than 80% of the area known as the National Petroleum Reserve - Alaska (NPR-A), removing Obama-era protections for about half of the area. Expanded drilling in the Western Arctic would threaten critical habitat for birds and other wildlife, food security for Alaska Native communities, and the climate.
In response, Dan Ritzman, Director of the Sierra Club's Lands Water Wildlife Campaign, released the following statement:
"We applaud the Biden administration for walking back Trump's disastrous assault on Alaska's public lands. After a year of devastating extreme weather events and unprecedented high temperatures in Alaska, the last thing we need is a massive expansion of oil drilling in the Arctic. But in order to achieve the administration's ambitious climate goals, it's not enough to go back to the Obama-era status quo. We urge the Biden administration to build on this progress by acting immediately to phase out all new leasing for fossil fuels on our public lands."
The Sierra Club is the most enduring and influential grassroots environmental organization in the United States. We amplify the power of our 3.8 million members and supporters to defend everyone's right to a healthy world.
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Critics Warn Trump EPA Pick Zeldin 'Will Make Our Air and Water Dirtier' to Enrich Polluters
The choice, said one climate leader, "lays bare Donald Trump's intentions to, once again, sell our health, our communities, our jobs, and our future out to corporate polluters."
Nov 12, 2024
As U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's Cabinet continued to take shape on Tuesday, climate and environmental campaigners expressed deep concerns about his pick to lead the Environmental Protection Agency: Lee Zeldin.
Like the EPA administrators from Trump's first term—former coal lobbyist Andrew Wheeler and "fossil fuel puppet" Scott Pruitt—Zeldin is expected to pursue the Republican's plan to "drill, baby, drill," despite the devastating consequences for the global climate.
In a statement announcing Zeldin as his pick, Trump unironically pledged the former New York congressman would usher in a new era of deregulation but ensure the United States has "the cleanest air and water on the planet." Zeldin similarly promised to achieve "U.S. energy dominance" while also "protecting access to clean air and water." Green groups responded with forceful criticism.
"We need a steady, experienced hand at EPA to marshal federal resources to fight climate change and utilize the full power of the law to protect communities from toxic pollution," Earthjustice president Abbie Dillen said Tuesday. "Lee Zeldin is not that person."
"His loyalty to Donald Trump indicates he will gladly take a sledgehammer to EPA's most recent lifesaving regulations, putting politics over science and endangering our communities," she warned. "It is clear President-elect Trump is prioritizing loyalty above actual qualifications to address our current and future environmental concerns."
Sierra Club executive director Ben Jealous declared that choosing a candidate "who opposes efforts to safeguard our clean air and water lays bare Donald Trump's intentions to, once again, sell our health, our communities, our jobs, and our future out to corporate polluters. Our lives, our livelihoods, and our collective future cannot afford Lee Zeldin—or anyone who seeks to carry out a mission antithetical to the EPA's mission."
"2024 will assuredly surpass 2023 as the hottest year on record," he noted. "Across the country, we are experiencing record droughts, heatwaves, and deadly storms, wiping out entire communities in a matter of hours. Americans need and deserve someone who will put them first, not millionaires sitting in board rooms seeking to increase the profits of multibillion-dollar international corporations."
"We have made too much progress to allow Donald Trump and Lee Zeldin to take us back," Jealous added. "We will not give up the clean energy manufacturing jobs rebuilding communities. We will not accept more dangerous air and water. And we will not allow Trump, Zeldin, and corporate polluters to steal our future."
While campaigning against Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris—who was widely supported by green groups—Trump told Big Oil executives that he would repeal the Biden-Harris administration's climate policies if they poured $1 billion into electing him.
"Big Oil spent millions of dollars propping up Donald Trump's campaign—and he's not wasting any time giving them a good return on their investment," Climate Power executive director Lori Lodes said Monday. "Lee Zeldin is already promising to slash critical protections as head of the EPA."'
"During Donald Trump's first term in office, he slashed over 125 environmental protections and let polluters off the hook for putting harmful chemicals into our air and water," Lodes pointed out. "Trump's second term agenda will make our air and water dirtier just to make billionaires and big corporations richer—and Americans will pay the price."
After serving in the New York State Senate, Zeldin represented the 1st Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2015 to 2023, during which he was one of Trump's allies—or as Fossil Free Media's Jamie Henn put it, "ass-kissing sycophants."
Zeldin unsuccessfully ran for New York governor in 2022, during which he campaigned on reversing the state's ban on hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. He has a 14% lifetime score from the League of Conservation Voters.
E&E Newsspoke with multiple sources who believe Zeldin will be able to implement the incoming administration's playbook. Frank Maisano, a senior principal at lobbying firm Bracewell, described him as a fixture in "Trump World" who is "totally with the president's agenda."
"The EPA administrator last time... you had somebody who wasn't politically savvy and was an attorney general who just ramrodded his policy through and didn't have any real political acumen in the space," he said, referring to Pruitt.
"The agenda, I believe, needs to be radical, and there will be a lot of opposition from the mainstream media, environmental groups, the Democrats in Congress," Maisano added. "The job of deregulation is going to need someone who can also be a good defender and explainer of what they're trying to do and what it will accomplish, and why it's important and why it's not wrecking the environment."
Meanwhile, climate organizations and Democratic critics emphasize that wrecking the environment is Trump's plan and they are determined to fight against it.
"We count on the EPA to protect clean air and water and public health and that's what we'll hold the next administrator accountable to do," said Natural Resources Defense Council president Manish Bapna, taking aim at Zeldin's promises to "revitalize our auto industry to bring back American jobs, and make the U.S. the global leader" of artificial intelligence.
"Current EPA standards and federal incentives are already revitalizing the auto industry in precisely the way the industry sees its own future, with more than 160 electric vehicle projects totaling $82 billion in investment announced in just the past two years," Bapna explained. "Repealing these policies, as Trump has said he'll do, would devastate the industry in a moment of critical transition, threatening jobs, increasing tailpipe pollution that's wrecking the climate, and driving up consumer costs."
"Similarly, we can meet demand for data centers without scrapping EPA rules to clean up dirty power plants and cut climate pollution," he added. "We need EPA leadership that will protect the environment and public health. That's a big enough job without looking outside the agency's charge."
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UN Climate Chief Warns Inaction on Emissions Will Deliver 'Inflation on Steroids'
"Climate finance is global inflation insurance. Rampant climate costs should be public enemy number one," the U.N. official told world leaders at COP29.
Nov 12, 2024
As he addressed world leaders at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Baku, Azerbaijan on Tuesday, U.N. climate chief Simon Stiell made the case that action against the planetary emergency can help combat an economic problem plaguing nations around the world: inflation.
Far from a threat reserved for future generations, Stiell told ministers gathered for day one of the conference's World Leaders Climate Action Summit that the climate crisis was "fast becoming an economy killer," already slashing some nations' gross domestic products by up to 5%.
"The climate crisis is a cost-of-living crisis," Still said, "because climate disasters are driving up costs for households and businesses. Worsening climate impacts will put inflation on steroids unless every country can take bolder climate action."
Stiell's remarks come amid growing discussion of the impact of inflation on political stability following the victory of Donald Trump in the U.S. presidential election last week. In the wake of Trump's win, commenters have pointed out that almost every country that voted in 2024 voted to oust the incumbent party, and inflation following the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia's invasion of Ukraine is one prominent explanation.
Stiell told the leaders gathered at COP29 that they should learn from that inflation spike when making decisions about climate.
"Let's learn the lessons from the pandemic—when billions suffered because we didn't take the collective action fast enough when supply chains were smashed," Stiell said. "Let's not make that mistake again."
"Climate finance is global inflation insurance," Stiell continued. "Rampant climate costs should be public enemy number one."
"Unless emissions plummet and adaptation soars, every economy will face far greater fury."
In his remarks to the leaders summit, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres also emphasized the economic impacts of climate-fueled disasters.
"No country is spared," Guterres said. "In our global economy, supply chain shocks raise costs—everywhere. Decimated harvests push up food prices—everywhere. Destroyed homes increase insurance premiums—everywhere."
Guterres also tied the climate emergency to economic inequality, citing a recent Oxfam study finding that billionaires emit more greenhouse gases in an hour and a half than an ordinary person will during their entire life.
"This is a story of avoidable injustice. The rich cause the problem, the poor pay the highest price," Guterres said, adding that "unless emissions plummet and adaptation soars, every economy will face far greater fury."
However, both U.N. leaders saw hope in a rapid and equitable transition to renewable energy.
"Bolder climate action can drive economic opportunity and abundance everywhere. Cheap, clean energy can be the bedrock of your economies. It means more jobs, more growth, less pollution choking cities, healthier citizens, and stronger businesses," Stiell said.
Guterres argued that "the economic imperative is clearer and more compelling with every renewables roll out, every innovation, and every price drop" and called doubling down on fossil fuels "absurd."
"The clean energy revolution is here," Guterres continued. "No group, no business, and no government can stop it. But you can and must ensure it is fair, and fast enough to limit global temperature rise to 1.5°C."
Currently, national policies put the world on track for 3.1°C of heating, which scientists warn would have devastating consequences for ecosystems and human communities.
Both Stiell and Guterres urged leaders to rapidly reduce their climate pollution and agree to a new finance goal at COP29 to help developing countries fund their green transitions and adapt to increasing climate impacts.
"On climate finance, the world must pay up, or humanity will pay the price," Guterres said.
Stiell warned that "billions of people simply cannot afford for their government to leave COP29 without a global climate finance goal."
"These are not easy times, but despair is no strategy, and it's not warranted," Stiell concluded. "Our process is strong, and it will endure. After all, international cooperation is the only way humanity survives global heating. The time for hand-wringing is over; so let's get on with the job."
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Continuing 'Ethnic Cleansing' Campaign, Israel Blows Past US Deadline for Gaza Aid
One advocate urged action "to prevent further loss of innocent life, the deepening of an extraordinary humanitarian crisis, and the continued erosion of U.S. credibility as an upholder of international humanitarian law."
Nov 12, 2024
As the deadline set by the Biden administration last month for Israel to step up aid deliveries to Gaza passed on Tuesday, human rights groups demanded that the U.S. stick to its commitment to holding the Israeli government accountable for what one advocate called "a campaign of ethnic cleansing."
But the White House's refusal over the last 13 months to follow U.S. and international law provoked doubt that it would do so.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin wrote a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government on October 13, giving Israel 30 days to allow at least 350 humanitarian aid trucks per day into Gaza, open a fifth crossing into the enclave, and ensure access to northern Gaza for aid groups, among other specific steps outlined in the letter.
Noncompliance would violate National Security Memorandum 20, which President Joe Biden issued in February to demand credible assurances from Israel that it was acting according to international law, and Section 620I of the Foreign Assistance Act, which prohibits the U.S. from providing military aid to countries that are blocking U.S. humanitarian aid.
Advocates have said for months that Israel and the U.S. have been violating both statutes, as mounting evidence has shown U.S. weapons have been used in Israeli attacks on civilians and United Nations experts have warned Gaza has descended into famine.
Louise Wateridge, a senior emergency officer for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), said Tuesday that the Biden administration's warning 30 days ago did not improve conditions in Gaza, with aid entering the enclave "at its lowest level in months."
"Thousands and thousands of people have been killed senselessly. They have been killed because there is lack of aid, because the bombs have continued, and because we have not been able to even reach them under the rubble," Wateridge said at a press briefing in Geneva. "The average for October was 37 trucks a day into the entire Gaza Strip... That is for 2.2 million people... Children are dying. People are dying every day."
With the number of daily deliveries since October 13 far below the level stipulated by the Biden administration, Wateridge emphasized that "anything that happens now is already too late."
As the deadline passed, Israel appeared eager to put new humanitarian aid efforts on display, with the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) posting on social media an image of a convoy delivering what it said were "hundreds of food and water packages to the Jabaliya and Beit Hanoun areas in 6n Gaza."
The military also arranged a photo call on Monday where journalists "were invited to film around eight aid trucks passing into Gaza," reported Jon Donnison at the BBC. "They were laden with sacks of flour, rice, and toilet paper, among other things."
"So, aid is getting into Gaza," wrote Donnison. "But nowhere near enough."
Before Israel began its bombardment of Gaza in October 2023, about 500 aid trucks entered the enclave each day.
A spokesperson for COGAT told the BBC Tuesday that "most aspects [of Blinken's demands] have been met and those which have not are being discussed."
The publisher of a Substack newsletter titled Gaza Updatessaid in response, "In other words, expect nothing today."
U.N. officials said this week that aid workers have been unable to deliver relief even after the Israel Defense Forces gave approval for deliveries in northern Gaza, which has been cut of from virtually all aid for more than a month. Israeli troops on the ground have restricted aid despite the IDF's approval.
In southern Gaza, hundreds of trucks containing aid have been sitting on the enclave's side of the border with Egypt because U.N. workers cannot reach them due to "lawlessness, theft, and Israeli military restrictions," according to The Associated Press.
As the deadline passed Tuesday, a coalition of human rights groups including Oxfam, Refugees International, and Save the Children released a scorecard assessing Israel's progress in complying with the conditions set by Blinken and Austin on October 13.
They found "outright failure" by Israel to meet 15 out of 19 measures of compliance, and said the IDF has only partially complied with the remaining four.
Israel has failed to allow 350 aid trucks into Gaza over the last month, said the groups, and has not ended the isolation of northern Gaza or allowed the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) access to Palestinians detained by Israel, among other requirements set last month.
"The U.S. government once again laid out basic measures for how the government of Israel must follow international law and allow for aid delivery in Gaza," said Oxfam America president and CEO Abby Maxman. "Since then, we have seen Israeli forces accelerate their efforts to bombard, depopulate, deprive, and erase the Palestinian population of the North Gaza governorate. We are witnessing a campaign of ethnic cleansing."
"Oxfam and partner organizations are unable to provide any support to the remaining civilians in the North Gaza governorate, where people are dying every day," added Maxman. "jAccess to the rest of Gaza is also severely restricted, with civilians facing starvation and relentless violence. The U.S. must finally make this overdue call to suspend deadly arms sales to Israel or be complicit in the horrific atrocities unfolding before our eyes."
Michelle Nunn, president and CEO of CARE, said that with the letter sent to Netanyahu's government last month, the U.S. "created a critical opportunity to respond to the facts on the ground, and to insist upon accountability to our own laws."
"It is imperative to act now to prevent further loss of innocent life, the deepening of an extraordinary humanitarian crisis, and the continued erosion of U.S. credibility as an upholder of international humanitarian law," said Nunn.
The analysis, added Refugees International president Jeremy Konyndyk, "demonstrates that the Israeli government is violating its obligations under U.S. and international law to facilitate humanitarian relief for suffering Palestinians in Gaza."
"With experts again projecting imminent famine in north Gaza, there is no time to lose," he added. "The United States must impose immediate restrictions on security cooperation with Israel as required under Section 620I of the Foreign Assistance Act."
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