Joe Biden If President Will Push Allies Like Australia To Do More On Climate, Adviser Says

The Guardian - Daniel Hurst

Jake Sullivan says the former vice-president, if elected, won’t ‘pull any punches’ on what is a global problem

If elected president, Joe Biden will hold China accountable for doing more on climate, says adviser. Photograph: Leah Millis/Reuters

Joe Biden will not pull any punches with allies including Australia in seeking to build international momentum for stronger action on the climate crisis, an adviser to the US presidential candidate has said.

If elected in November, Biden will hold heavy emitters such as China accountable for doing more “but he’s also going to push our friends to do more as well”, according to Jake Sullivan, who was the national security adviser to Biden when he was vice-president and is now in the candidate’s inner circle.

In a wide-ranging podcast interview with the Sydney-based Lowy Institute, Sullivan also signalled that Biden would work closely with Australia and other regional allies in responding to the challenges posed by the rise of China.

While Australia’s prime minister, Scott Morrison, is likely to welcome the pledge of US coordination with allies on regional security issues, there may be unease in government ranks about the potential for tough conversations about Australia’s climate policies.

The Coalition government has resisted calls to embrace a target of net-zero emissions by 2050 and it proposes to use Kyoto carryover credits to meet Australia’s 2030 emission reductions pledge. Some Coalition backbenchers still openly dispute climate science.

Sullivan said climate change would be a big priority for Biden, both in domestic policy – with climate and clean energy issues placed at the heart of his economic recovery visions – and in foreign policy, where he would do more than just reverse Donald Trump’s decision to abandon the Paris agreement.

“He has said right out of the gate, we’re not just rejoining Paris – we are going to rally the nations of the world to get everyone to up their game, to elevate their ambition, to do more,” Sullivan told the Lowy Institute.

“And in that regard he will hold countries like China accountable for doing more but he’s also going to push our friends to do more as well and to step up and fulfil their responsibilities to what is fundamentally a global problem, that every country needs to be participating in and contributing to.”

Sullivan said there was “no reason it has to get awkward” for countries like Australia.

“The vice-president is not going to come to play games around that issue if he’s fortunate enough to be elected. He’ll lay it out in the way only Joe Biden can do – just plain and straight, down the line, respectful – but he’s not going to pull any punches on it.”

Sullivan made the remarks in an interview with Michael Fullilove, the executive director of the Lowy Institute, who told Guardian Australia last month that climate was likely to “come roaring back as an issue in US foreign policy under a Biden administration” and that it “may be harder to say no to a Biden administration”.

Biden has vowed to put the US on “an irreversible path to achieve net-zero emissions, economy-wide” by 2050, and to rally the rest of the world to meet the climate threat – indicating that he would “fully integrate climate change” into US foreign policy and national security strategies, as well as its approach to trade.

The economist Ross Garnaut has also speculated that a Biden win could lead to Australia being placed “in the naughty corner” on climate policy.

More broadly, Sullivan said Biden would be “eager to develop a really strong relationship” with Morrison – who has formed close working ties with Trump, even though the Australian government has emphasised points of difference from time to time.

Sullivan said Biden had a deep respect for Australia and its contributions to US security and the history of the alliance between the two countries.

Biden and Morrison were likely to “get off to a strong start” because the former vice-president saw Australia as the kind of partner that was central to a finding successful strategies when faced with a range of issues in a fast-changing world.

Sullivan said Biden put like-minded democratic allies at the heart of his foreign policy, because he believed that was the platform upon which the US could most effectively deal with great power competition and transnational challenges.

“Allies are going to have pride of place in the hierarchy of priorities in a Biden administration foreign policy,” Sullivan said. He said allies including Australia, Japan, South Korea and Nato were important not just on regional issues but more broadly.

“And yes, the rise of China is at or near the top of the list of big global challenges that we all have to be working effectively together on.”

Links

• Joe Biden's bold climate policies would leave Australia behind
• PODCAST: Michael Fullilove speaks with Jake Sullivan, the senior policy adviser to Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Joe Biden
• The US is headed for climate disaster – but Joe Biden's green plan might just work
• Lambasting China over its emissions might impress the US but it could be costly for Australia
• 'The US enterprise is up for grabs': why the Trump-Biden race is so important for Australia
• Scott Morrison ducks questions on Australia's emissions strategy for 2050
• Angus Taylor says it is not Australian government policy to achieve net zero emissions by 2050
• Climate crisis could displace 1.2bn people by 2050, report warns

Stark New Imagery Reveals The Scary Extent Of West Coast Wildfires

Live Science - Stephanie Pappas

The fires stretch from Washington to California.

(Image: © CIRA)

Disturbing new satellite imagery shows the vast scope of the wildfires burning in Washington, Oregon and California. Dozens of fires have turned skies orange, rained ash on cities and towns, destroyed several million acres of land and killed at least seven people.

The Sept. 8 imagery comes courtesy of the Cooperative Institute for Research in the Atmosphere (CIRA) at Colorado State University. The GIF, posted on Twitter by meteorologist Dakota Smith, combines two types of imagery from the GOES-West Satellite: GeoColor, which shows the smoke clouds and the topography below; and Fire Temperature imagery, which uses infrared cameras to pinpoint the fires themselves.

Smoke pours and swirls from the fires. Updated imagery from Wednesday (Sept. 9) shows the blanket of smoke still enveloping the coast from the northern end of Oregon down. This smoke turned skies in the Bay Area and elsewhere along the coast an eerie, apocalyptic orange.

The severe fires this year are a result of heat and dry weather, and are exacerbated by climate change, according to climate researchers.

Thousands of people have evacuated their homes due to the fires, and hundreds have had to be rescued from approaching flames. California's Creek Fire, which started on Sept. 4 in the Sierra National Forest and which spawned a towering pyrocumulonimubus cloud more than 8.5 miles (14,000 meters) tall, required California's Air National Guard to rescue 200 people trapped by the fires.

At least 2.5 million acres (1 million hectares) have been destroyed in California alone, according to CNBC. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown told reporters on Wednesday that the towns of Detroit, Blue River, Vida, Phoenix and Talent have been "substantially destroyed." Combined, those communities are home to approximately 13,350 people.

Brown said that about 300,000 acres (about 121,000 hectares) in Oregon were burning, or about 470 square miles (1,217 square kilometers). According to CalFire, California has lost 3.1 million acres, or about 4,844 square miles (12,546 square km), to wildfires since the beginning of this year.

There are currently 29 major fires burning in the Golden State. In Washington, where 10 fires are currently raging — one that killed a 1-year-old boy as his family fled their home in Cold Springs — more than 32,460 acres (50.7 square miles or 131 square km) have burned since the beginning of the year, the vast majority in July and August.

Links

• 10 signs that Earth’s climate is off the rails
• Yosemite aflame: Rim fire in photos
• 10 ways the Earth changed forever in 2019
• Wildfires Blaze in Northern California (Photos)
• US's wet Pacific north-west experiences unprecedented severe fires
• Wildfires turn San Francisco sky orange as 'unprecedented' conditions stoke blazes across the western US
• California Inferno Means Climate Crisis Is Happening Now 
• In California's smoke-filled horizon, it's become hard to breathe
• Wildfires burned millions of acres across the West. See what that looks like.
• Even Climate Scientists Are Freaked Out By This Year’s Wildfires 
• The Biggest Wildfire in California History Is Happening Right Now

Managers Of $40 ($AU55) Trillion Make Plans To Decarbonize The World

Forbes - James Conca

European New Exchange Technology in Amsterdam is the largest stock exchange in Europe, one of the cogs in a global financial system needing to be harnessed to address global issues like climate change. Amsterdam Municipal Department for the Preservation and Restoration of Historic Buildings and Sites

The Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change (IIGCC) is a European group of global pension funds and investment managers, totaling over 1,200 members in 16 countries, who control more than $40 trillion ($AU55 trillion) in assets (€33 trillion).

They have drawn up a plan to cut carbon in their portfolios to net-zero and hope other investors will join them.

The group’s mission is to mobilize capital for a global low-carbon transition and to ensure resiliency of investments and markets in the face of the changes, including the changing climate itself.

They provide asset managers with a set of recommended actions, policies, collaborations, measures and methods to help them meet the net-zero goal by 2050 in an effort to address climate change. Their framework was developed with more than 70 funds worldwide.

The European Union aims to be climate-neutral by 2050 – an economy with net-zero greenhouse gas emissions.

This objective is at the heart of the European Green Deal and in line with the EU’s commitment to global climate action under the Paris Agreement.

Following the Paris Climate Agreement, asset managers have been under increasing pressure to reduce their carbon footprint as their investors focus on sustainability and on the negative effects of climate change. But a lack of consensus on the best path forward has slowed any real action to a crawl.

Enter IIGCC.

"Countries, cities and companies around the globe are committing to achieve the goal of net-zero emissions and investors need to show similar leadership," Stephanie Pfeifer, IIGCC's chief executive officer, said in a statement.

IIGCC’s framework for accomplishing this ambitious agenda is pretty intricate and all inclusive, including, among a lot of other things -

1. Engaging on finance and climate policy at the global, EU and national levels across Europe.
2. Providing intelligence and analysis on the latest policy developments of relevance for members.
3. Developing policy positions to ensure a joined-up investor response on relevant issues.
4. Helping inform the policy dialogue and perspective of key stakeholders, to ensure investor policy positions are well communicated, understood and reflected in final decisions and legislation.
5. Supporting members in their own engagement with policymakers.
6. Peer-to-peer collaboration and learning through workshops, roundtables and guidance documents.
7. Collaborating with like-minded groups and working closely with global and European bodies, such as the UNFCCC, European Commission, OECD, Mission 2020 and fellow members of the Global Investor Coalition on Climate Change, among others.

But this is a very big lift. Decarbonizing the global economy is a massive endeavor. How do we provide sufficient and reliable power for 10 billion people to survive in a warming world, without trashing the planet even more?

Before 2020, total fossil fuel use had been increasing as the world continues to develop. From 2007 to 2020, annual global electricity use alone went from about 15 trillion kWhs to over 24 trillion kWhs. And that will continue to increase until about 2040, to probably over 35 trillion kWhs/year.

According to the International Energy Administration, global coal demand reached an all-time high in 2018 and is estimated to remain flat until the mid-twenties, despite temporary drops from local policy decisions or because of the pandemic.

Similarly, oil and natural gas have been increasing worldwide although a glut in gas storage, the pandemic and mild temperatures have led to a slight global drop in demand this year.

So reversing this trend will take as much effort and money as it took to get here.

The only way to decarbonize is with a mix of all non-fossil technologies including nuclear, hydro and renewables. We’ve been talking about this for decades but it will take more effort than one thinks.

Using oil an example, we need to replace internal combustion engines with mostly electric vehicles charged with non-fossil fuel-generated electricity.

Other transportation fuels like biofuels and hydrogen, can help but none can ramp up their infrastructure quickly enough to make a real dent in oil use, which averages over 90 million barrels/day, 70% of which goes towards transportation.

The equivalent in electricity to charge an all-electric vehicle fleet is about 28 billion kWhs/day, the output of almost 2,000,000 MW of new installed generation. This is another 10 trillion kWhs/year, bringing our total future energy needs worldwide to about 45 trillion kWhs/year.

At a world average price of 14¢/kWh, that represents about $6 trillion/year.

But we spend over $5 trillion globally on fossil fuel subsidies and these would be freed up for this task of decarbonization if we forgo fossil fuel. So cost doesn’t have to be the big issue we think it is.

Plus, if a society uses coal for over 30% of its energy needs, their health care costs increase about 10%. Global spending on health care totals about $8 trillion, so replacing coal could save up to $800 billion/year. That, plus ending the subsidies, could well pay for most of this huge change.

But it will take some serious financial management to accomplish. And who better than investment managers to do that.

Links

• Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change
• Managers of $16T set out plan to decarbonize investments
• Atmospheric greenhouse gases
• The EU aims to be climate-neutral by 2050
• European Green Deal
• Renewable and sustainable energy
• Global Energy Review 2020
• Rising fossil fuel support poses a threat to building a healthier and climate-safe future