this post was submitted on 18 Aug 2023

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Republican Presidential Candidates on Climate (www.nytimes.com)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/1514949

I wouldn't consider voting for any of these people in the general election, but I recognize that people often live in gerrymandered districts, and therefore vote in Republican primaries in order to have some influence over their local representatives. For people living in such a district, choosing a least-bad candidate is a way try and moderate the Republican party just a bit.

Candidates are listed by poll-based estimates of their support, which makes it rather clear that Republicans as a whole have sought to reject any kind of meaningful path to zero greenhouse gas emissions.

Trump: His actions as president may have caused irreversible damage to the global climate.

DeSantis: He has supported efforts to adapt to the effects of climate change, but not to prevent it.

Scott: He acknowledges climate change but rejects most efforts to stop it.

Ramaswamy: He opposes all government efforts to reduce carbon emissions.

Haley: She supports carbon-capture technology but has denounced efforts to reduce emissions.)

Pence: He claims climate change is exaggerated and would prioritize domestic energy production.

Christie: He supports action on climate change with some caveats.

Hutchinson: He denounces government mandates but supports private renewable energy development.

Burgum: He has supported carbon-capture as governor, but what he would do as president is unclear.

Hurd: He acknowledges that climate change is a major threat, but what he would do is unclear.

Suarez: He has pursued significant emission reductions in Miami.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

Its insane given the last few years that the staunches deniers have not faced reality. My devil. The fires, the ice thinning, the hurricanes, the tonadoes, the heat waves, the floods...

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nothing will change so long as capitalists hold all of the political power and put their profits over the health of the planet and of humanity.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

We've gotten change by doing it with zero Republican votes.

Chart showing US emissions with and without the Inflation Reduction Act.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If you think voting for any of these ghouls will do anything to help you've lost the plot. Never vote for the fascists.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Most of the US has a partisan primary, where each party chooses candidates. Due to gerrymandering, one party or the other is pretty much guaranteed to win the general election fir state legislative seats and the house of representatives. So people in those places who want any influence at all vote in the primary for the party which will win the general election.

This post is for them

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Dude, then why are you talking about PRESIDENTIAL candidates? Shouldn't this be about congressional or state candidates?

Gerrymandering's only effect on presidential elections is on the rules that each state uses for the elections, not on who's guaranteed to win the election.

Further, none of the Republicans are going to be helpful at all in stopping or reducing the impacts of climate change. This is not helpful. Any encouragement to vote for fascists is doing the enemy's work for them.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Because people who vote in the state and congressional primaries typically also have to vote in the same presidential primary

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

You listed them in a different order from how they appear in the link preview and it's messing with my mind maaannnnnnn

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

I think focusing on climate change directly is not the right approach with Republicans. To them it's a culture war discussion, so they'll always point to the most extreme view to strawman their arguments.

I think it's far more interesting to discuss practical solutions that would help improve GPD generally, such as:

invest in high speed rail - trains are way more efficient than airplanes, both from a cost and emissions perspective; which of these would be interested in an effort to connect busy metro areas with high speed rail? (e.g. Miami <-> Atlanta via Orlando and Jacksonville, SF <-> LA, large metros in Texas, etc)
invest in nuclear power - we need more energy production, we have a ton of space for disposal of nuclear waste, and it's a cost effective solution
implement a carbon tax and refund it to Americans as a credit - this merely increases the costs of polluting products to encourage purchase of greener products

These target the biggest sources of pollution, transportation, energy, and industry, but without directly changing regulations or restricting anyone's freedom, it just makes some choices more expensive.

[+] [email protected] -8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Action with a lot of caveats is the best call for the average citizen. Christie has it right. The caveats must protect the American taxpayer, all levels of the middle and working classes lifestyles, maintain our current energy needs, allow us to continue to enjoy our lives and of course not raise energy costs. If they can get all that done and it’s transparent then great. Go for it. But, people that worked hard to own a moderately nice home with some property are not giving it up due to some green sales pitch. We don’t want to be forced to drive junk EVs. We don’t want to shut the AC off in the middle of summer. We like our gas stoves. Stuff like that. Hands off.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Gas stoves and vehicles are outdated, dirty technology that will die out on their own, no reason not to speed that up. Just because people are stubborn and don't like change, isnt a good reason to keep them.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Gas stoves aren't particularly dirty, and they make a ton of sense if you use gas for heat, which is quite efficient.

Home heating and cooking are very low on the list of carbon emissions, especially if you remove wood stoves (which should be obsolete outside of extremely remote areas).

The focus should be on the higher contributors to emissions:

28% - transportation
25% - electric power
23% - industry

Transportation

The market is already moving toward EVs, so I don't think the government needs to do anything there. In fact, I'm in favor of removing subsidies and credits since the industry is already well established.

The focus here should be on improving mass transit so we don't need as many cars on the road in the first place. The last people to upgrade to EVs will be the first people to switch to mass transit if it worked for them, meaning the working class. So I think we should be expanding our rail infrastructure and building out high speed rail between popular destinations (e.g. SF <-> LA, LA <-> LV, Orlando <-> Miami, etc), light rail inside of cities, and forcing cars around busy centers serviced by mass transit (e.g. like the Dutch model that makes driving less convenient than the train/bikes, but still feasible).

Electric Power

We generate ~20% from coal and ~40% from natural gas, and areas that use coal generate a very high percentage (my area is >50%). So the focus should be on expanding nuclear power, especially in the middle of the country where there's plenty of space to dispose of nuclear waste and limited risk of natural disasters risking damaging the reactors (e.g. seismic activity, tornados are a concern, but other power plants deal with it).

We're going to see EV demand increase, so we definitely need to be investing in infrastructure today.

Industry

We should create a carbon tax and return that as a tax credit to the American public. This increases the costs of polluting goods relative to greener goods in such a way that companies will be motivated to reduce emissions so their costs are lower. I don't know that this looks like exactly, but I think it should approximate the cost to clean up those emissions. This should replace carbon credits.

I think each of these solutions is conservative friendly and moves us in a positive direction. The main thrust here is to nudge people toward better choices, not to ban poor choices.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Gas stoves have been proven to cause cancer. They are not clean https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-health-risks-of-gas-stoves-explained/

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

We're talking about greenhouse gas emissions, not cancer risk. Here's the relevant note from that article:

Lebel and his team found that methane emissions from gas stoves in U.S. homes could have as much impact on the climate as half a million cars.

I don't know if that has been confirmed, but even if it is, that's a relatively small amount of emissions. This article states the there are ~275M cars registered in the US. Even if only half of them are being used regularly (probably most cars are actively used), gas stoves contribute <0.2% (ok, maybe slightly higher since EVs and plugin hybrids are ~1.5% or so of total vehicles).

So it's a minor part of the total emissions, yet it's a huge part of many people's lifestyle. I think people should be free to choose whether to accept the higher cancer risks due to benzene leaks (which can be mitigated with proper ventilation). That's their call, the government should merely inform them of the risks and only place restrictions if there are tangible risks to children in the household (there are still studies on that).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I refuse to believe that someone's stove fuel is part of their personality.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I said nothing about personality, I said lifestyle. Cooking with gas is nice.

[–] [email protected] -5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Petrol vehicles arent outdated, LOL. They are very necessary for a multitude of reasons. Recently, even the CEO of Ford struggled mightily on a recent trip with an EV pickup. EVs are fine for quick errands, for driving to work/school, etc. They suck as recreational vehicles, sports cars, larger volume transport and various other things. Evs can co-exist with ICE vehicles. Thats the best were gonna do. Oh and BTW - we can NOT supply the electricity needed to charge a full fleet of EVs anyways. Just forget it.

Gas stoves are still preferred by many people and thats their right. They are not outdated either. While I own an electric stove, I dont have any problem with people choosing gas. What happens when the power goes out and we all have electric furnaces & stoves? Oops. That sucks.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Recently, even the CEO of Ford struggled mightily on a recent trip with an EV pickup.

I didn't follow that, but the typical problems are issues with the charging network (which can be solved by making them more like gas stations -- which is the natural evolution) and improvements to battery technology for faster charge times (which are on their way).

suck as recreational vehicles

Eh.... I'd say the jury is still out. This is a space that hasn't seen much investment, but I could see EVs with solar panels that you can just drive from campsite to campsite in the future, and never pay for power.

sports cars

I'm struggling with this one. I mean have you seen the acceleration on EVs? Electric motors are hands down superior in every way to an ICE.

larger volume transport

For now. This just needs a better breakthrough https://news.yahoo.com/nasa-incredible-solid-state-battery-130000645.html

Though really, it doesn't even need that. Just hand off trailers at rest stops while a truck is charging. It would be a change to the trucking industry, but I fail to see why that wouldn't be doable.

we can NOT supply the electricity needed to charge a full fleet of EVs anyways.

Oh hogwash. Says who? Show me your calculations that the grid can't be scaled and that nuclear, wind, tidal, solar, and geothermal can't capture more power.

Gas stoves are still preferred by many people and thats their right.

I'm not going to argue with this; gas is an efficient means of producing heat and I'm not that dogmatic. Though I have seen some links to gas stoves and asthma... But I think over time things will run their course, people don't use wood burning stoves anymore after all (because things naturally evolved).

What happens when the power goes out and we all have electric furnaces & stoves?

Well a more distributed grid based on renewables would be harder to "take down" to start with. There are tons of advantages to more localized power production in that sense (and to be fair dangers to utility workers that need worked through). ... this says nothing of the advantage to not needing to go to war over oil or the more stable electric generation prices vs barrels of oil/dependence on oil.

Ignoring that, your car is a giant battery, you could cook with it: https://www.engadget.com/gm-will-enable-vehicle-to-home-charging-on-all-ultium-based-evs-164248583.html

My personal opinion is that things need to be different, some things can lag (we don't need to force people to buy new stoves, furnaces, etc -- these things are really good at their jobs and efficient) and we shouldn't completely shut down production of those things, but it should be scaled back. We should generally focus on minimizing pain as we find new ways to do old things that don't depend on foreign energy, don't pollute the environment, and don't increase carbon.

Personally, I expect advances in EV technology to come at an increasingly rapid rate as economies of scale kick in. We're in an era of innovation again, there are going to be new designs, weird designs, etc. That will happen regardless of who's the president, unless someone actively gets in the way of it and uses political power to hinder renewables (Trump worries me the most in this regard).

In general, this isn't a "we can just keep doing the old thing" option though, we WILL run out of domestic oil, and we WILL make the very real climate crisis worse.

From what I've seen so far Christie would be the least bad option in the Republican field... Pretty good chance I'll still be voting Biden, but Christie is at least not a "hell no" from me.

Edit: This isn't just a war against climate change, it's a war for energy independence, and FINALLY having stable prices on transport costs.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

can you please link some valid sources that state your internal combustion engine, gas stove, and property are under remarkable threat of confiscation due to green policies?