The Democratic presidential candidates all have robust climate action agendas. The differences lie in how far, how fast and how much to spend.
for climate action that belies his brand of “incremental” progressivism. It doesn’t go as far as some of his rivals, but the Biden vision is hardly incremental. During the Obama administration, Biden was at the forefront of pushing the world to embrace bolder climate action and the Paris accord on global warming.
Faced with a hostile Congress, the Obama White House moved forward with aggressive administration actions aimed at cleaning up power plant emissions and moving the nation’s vehicle fleet toward significantly higher fuel efficiency. Biden recognizes that the Obama plans were ambitious but also that merely picking up where the last Democratic administration left off would not fully address the urgent warnings of climate scientists. He is calling for much further-reaching action and arguing that his deep experience in diplomacy makes him uniquely qualified to reposition the U.S. as the world leader in confronting global warming. “On Day One, Biden will sign a series of new executive orders with unprecedented reach that go well beyond the Obama-Biden administration platform and put us on the right track,” the candidate’s plan vows.Former New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s environmental agenda, unlike those of many of his opponents, does not advocate for a ban on fracking and would establish a moratorium on, instead of completely ban, all new fossil fuel leases on federal land. The billionaire has donated millions to environmental groups such as the Sierra Club Foundation, and last year he partnered with the group to launch Beyond Carbon, an initiative that advocates for green policy changes. In the 2017 book he co-wrote, “A Climate of Hope,” Bloomberg acknowledges that he isn’t a “stereotypical” environmentalist. “I don’t want to ban fracking or stop the Keystone pipeline and I support nuclear power,” he wrote. But he said he wanted to fight climate change “to save and improve lives.” His plan aims to cut emissions by 50% across the entire U.S. economy in 10 years and increase funding for research and development in clean energy and a clean grid to at least $25 billion each year. Bloomberg has not released an estimated cost of his entire climate change plan. He has chafed at the massive spending linked to the Green New Deal plan as envisioned by its authors in Congress. He said in a speech in New Hampshire early last year, as the proposal was unveiled, that he is tired of “things that are pie in the sky, that we never are going to pass, are never going to afford.” He drafted his own, narrower Green New Deal proposal.
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