Biden advocates for the climate

President Biden and former President Trump are worlds apart on climate policy. But do voters know that?

Polls show that most Americans are unaware that Biden has signed the largest climate bill in American history. And many may not remember that Trump withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement, the world’s most important climate treaty, and rolled back more than a hundred policies aimed at protecting the environment.

The fallout from the November election will be enormous: the Carbon Brief news service estimated that a Trump victory could result in more than 4 billion tons of additional US emissions by 2030.

Tonight, Biden will get a chance to emphasize those contrasts when he addresses Congress in the annual State of the Union address. I asked my colleague Lisa Friedman, who covers climate policy and politics, for a preview.

Manuela: What will the speech say about Biden’s climate policy?

Lisa: The economy is doing well, but it doesn’t seem like voters are giving the president credit for that. The influx of migrants across the United States’ southern border is a major political issue, and left-wing Democrats are outraged by Biden’s handling of Israel’s war in Gaza. But when it comes to climate, administration officials think he’s had a historic first term, and they want the president to tell that story.

It is not clear how much climate change will affect the real estate sector in Biden’s speech. Typically, his climate messages are wrapped in his economic vision. Last year, for example, the president’s first mention of the term “climate change” was linked to a promise to lower energy costs for families by providing tax breaks to weatherproof homes and encouraging the development of wind and solar energy.

It’s reasonable to expect more of the same this year. Biden has shown he is more comfortable framing climate change as a promise of “jobs, jobs jobsthen as a planetary crisis that needs to be resolved. It also ties in with Democrats’ hopes that Biden will underline the economic progress he has made and convey his vision for a second term.

Democrats want Biden to remind Americans that the Inflation Reduction Act, the president’s signature climate bill, has created more than 170,000 new jobs so far, and to talk about how wind, solar and other clean energy production energy is causing a production boom in countries like the United States. American Southeast. The White House invites a few special guests to the speech, including a plumber and a labor leader, to make this point.

Manuela: Are there parts of the climate agenda that he is less likely to talk about, for fear of the reaction of swing voters?

Lisa: Yes, more divisive policies, such as regulations on car and power plant emissions, are expected to be finalized by the Environmental Protection Agency later this spring.

It will be interesting to see if Biden will hint at what a second term could bring on climate. As our colleague Coral Davenport has reported, a second Biden administration will likely try to reduce greenhouse gases from steel, cement and other hard-to-clean production. But, as she wrote, “talking about more regulation at the start of what promises to be an election cycle is dangerous,” so chances are we won’t hear much on that front either.

Manuela: Young people were a strong force for Biden in 2020. But you wrote a few months ago that they were angry about his support for major oil and gas projects like Willow in Alaska. What can Biden do in that area?

Lisa: Analysts told me that Biden still needs to strengthen his support for these young voters. Earlier this month, four prominent youth activist groups called on Biden to “Finish the jobon a range of issues, including climate, and demanded that he reject all new oil and gas projects while ensuring the United States reaches 100 percent clean energy by 2035.

Another thing that would cause a stir among this group is if Biden is willing to declare climate change a national security emergency if he wins a second term.

That formal declaration would free up certain temporary powers to boost renewable energy and curb investments in fossil fuels, and it’s something young activists have made a key priority.

Manatees with frequent flyer miles

Calliope, Soleil and Piccolina, three orphaned girls, arrived one after another at ZooTampa’s manatee hospital.

One of them was found alone in shallow water, with her umbilical cord still attached. Two months later, another was rescued from a canal. Then came the smallest they’d ever gotten: Manatees would normally weigh about 65 pounds at birth, but this one was only 44 pounds.

It was 2021, a bad year for manatees in Florida. Decades of pollution from sewage and fertilizers had led to a massive die-off of seagrass, on which the animals depend for food. Conservationists counted hundreds of emaciated corpses. Other threats persisted, such as boat strikes and poisoning from red tide, a toxic algae.

Calliope, Soleil and Piccolina joined the dozens of manatees each year who receive personalized interventions, similar to ambulance rides, intensive care units and long-term rehabilitation. Some even fly on airplanes before being released back into the wild.

For the three manatees, that meant a return flight to Ohio.

Read more about their journey here. — Catrin Einhorn