Is Biden’s Climate Ambitions too much for voters?



Bad policy choices contribute to the energy supply crunch. Photo: Associated Press

As Glasgow approaches - Governments are making unprecedented promises …

Are they willing to put their money where their mouth is?

Obama

signed on under the Paris climate agreement would have hit roughly $50 billion in 2030, or about $140 per person. 

A recent Washington Post survey found that a majority of Americans would vote against a $24 annual climate tax on their electricity bills.

 Even if they’d hand over $140, it’d reduce global temperatures by a minuscule 0.06 degree Fahrenheit.


President Biden

Is promising  to spend $2 trillion over four years on climate policies—equivalent to $1,500 per person per year. And Mr. Biden’s current promise—100% carbon emission reduction by 2050—will be even more phenomenally expensive.

A new study in Nature finds that a 95% reduction in American carbon emissions by 2050 will annually cost 11.9% of U.S. gross domestic product. 

To put that in perspective: Total expenditure on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid came to 11.6% of GDP in 2019. The annual cost of trying to hit Mr. Biden’s target will rise to $4.4 trillion by 2050. 

That’s more than everything the federal government is projected to take in this year in tax revenue. 

That’s  $11,300 per person per year, or almost 500 times more than what a majority of Americans is willing to pay.

This would create a reduction in temperature of 0.3 degree Fahrenheit. This is because the U.S. will make up an ever-smaller share of emissions as the populations of China, India and Africa grow and get richer.


Indian Power Minister Raj Kumar Singh 

Net zero is a “pie in the sky,” and “you can’t stop” developing countries from using more and more fossil fuels. 

As Curt Carlson says 

“ Focus on innovation to bring down the price of cleaner energy - 

An investment I believe  voters willing be prepared to pay.

Some amazing things that are happenning

Regenerative agricultural practices are all about CO2 removal and sequestration. Nestle is going there with 500,000 farms:

 https://www.foodnavigator.com/Article/2021/09/20/We-must-go-further-Nestle-invests-a-billion-euros-in-regenerative-agricultural-push




On Oct 9, 2021, at 9:55 AM, Curt Carlson <curt@practiceofinnovation.com> wrote:

 Great.  Lots of work going on.  For CO2 removal cost is the issue.  Ideally, it will create positive new businesses.  

Herman - Lots of interesting stuff in that space indeed! Check out https://airminers.org/ or This about very exciting emerging storage solutions: https://youtu.be/UDjgSSO98VI

or

Paul Hawken’s newest; Regeneration

or 
the already mentioned Foundation for Climate Restoration: https://video.earthxtv.com/shows/foundation-climate-restoration/season/1/episode/1