Full steam ahead . . . ?

PRESENTED BY STATIC OLMS

For twenty-five years, the gun lobby and their Republican allies blocked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from studying gun deaths, as they knew an informed citizenry might reduce the sales of child-murder machines.

Now, the fossil-fuel lobby and their Republican allies are desperately trying to stop the Securities and Exchange Commission from issuing climate risk disclosure rules, which would require companies to state what risk climate disasters pose for them, and how much their activities involve the burning of fossil fuels. But, as the SEC’s only Republican member Hester Peirce complained, that information might lead to people doing something about climate destruction!

Comments on the SEC proposal are open through May 20.

The fossil-fuel lobby and their Republican allies are similarly upset about the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s proposed rule on greenhouse pollution for natural gas projects, which FERC will be discussing at today’s meeting, possibly with the announcement that the proposal will be watered down. That, of course, is not sufficient for the fossil-fueled Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), who yesterday introduced legislation to block the FERC climate-pollution rule.

VOYNA I MIR: The collapse of Russia’s government continues. Russia’s John Kerry—Anatoly Chubais, the Russian architect of its 1990s economic reforms and the man who gave Vladimir Putin his first job in the Kremlin—has stepped down from his current post as climate envoy and fled Russia because of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Bloomberg broke the story but did not include a byline, I guess to protect its reporters and sources. The reporters at the Russian state news agency Interfax are bravely reporting it out.

The “heat pumps for peace and freedom” plan championed by Bill McKibben continues to build steam: Democratic senators Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren (Mass.), Martin Heinrich (N.M.), Jeff Merkley (Ore.), and Martin Heinrich (N.M.) sent a letter yesterday to the White House asking President Biden to use the Defense Production Act and military sales to “support and increase manufacturing capacity and supply chain security for technologies that reduce fossil fuel demand and fuel costs, such as electric heat pumps, efficient electric appliances, renewable energy generation and storage, and other clean technologies.”

And Faiz Shakir continues to beat the drum that Democrats need to take aggressive action to stop Big Oil’s war profiteering and give that money to the American people instead:

In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom has proposed a reasonably smart $11 billion plan for his state, which would moderately lower gas taxes, give residents stimulus checks, and invest in public transit and rail.

FIGHTING FOR THE END OF COAL: “The jury trial for a group of protesters who tried to stop a train bringing coal to a power plant in Bow began Tuesday in a Concord courtroom. The 2019 protest was part of an ongoing campaign in New England to end the use of fossil fuels like coal, which are the main driver of climate change.” Yesterday, the five activists on trial explained to the jury why they blocked the coal train, and today, closing arguments are being offered before the jury deliberation. Follow @NoCoalNoGas for updates on the trial:

The nation’s coal plants are closing at a rapid clip: New Jersey regulators approved the plan by Atlantic City Electric to close the state’s last two coal plants by 2024, saving ratepayers up to $30 million. Regulatory board president Joseph L. Fiordaliso commented:

Our good friend, coal baron Joe Manchin (D-W. Va.), of course feels differently on how steam should be generated. He has successfully killed off the Green New Deal ambitions of Joe Biden’s Build Back Better agenda—first nixing the clean electric generation standard, then the social infrastructure components (with the argument that poor families would use financial assistance to buy drugs), then the fee on methane pollution—leaving only a package of energy tax credits that resemble those that have been part of the all-of-the-above energy agenda for the past 15 years.

Coddled by fellow Democrats and climate lobbyists, Manchin is now reshaping what he will accept out of the tax breaks, announcing yesterday that the incentives for electric vehicles have to go and that the dirty-energy 45Q subsidies should be increased.

He issued his latest bull as the skunk at the party in Paris, spouting off at the International Energy Agency ministerial meeting after a fawning introduction from Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm.

The Koch machine is still leading the funding of the climate denial network. The Sunrise Movement warns Democrats that they will lose young voters with their abandonment of the Green New Deal agenda. United Nations Secretary General António Guterres calls for extreme weather warning systems for everyone on earth. Arctic climate scientists are starting to let Inuits into their ranks. American Indian communities are downwind of more air pollution than most people. Texas wildfires claim another victim.

Digital director Brittany Bennett is moving on from Sunrise Movement.

JERBS: Chesapeake Climate Action is looking for a Richmond-based Virginia director ($75K-$85K).

Climate Action Today:

• 10 AM: Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
  March Commission Meeting

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