Trump's concerted assault on Earth
His budget decimates efforts to address global warming
It’s almost impossible to keep track of all of the things that Trump is doing that actually increases the pace of global warming around the world. Several items in Trump’s budget highlight this effort:
a new excise tax on wind and solar projects which is estimated to increase consumer energy prices 8% to 10% and would tax clean energy businesses an additional $4-$7 billion by 2036.
scaling back and eliminating renewable energy tax breaks were expanded in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. This includes tax breaks for individuals for electric vehicles, wind and solar development, and energy efficient appliances and tax credits for clean electricity-generating projects. Eliminating these existing tax credits would kill up to 72% of the new wind and solar installations that were to be completed in the U.S. over the next decade.
eliminating $608 million in funding for NOAA’s Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (the federal agency in charge of weather, climate and ocean predictions). This includes massive cuts to work that includes monitoring global greenhouse gas concentrations, operating flights to track ground-level ozone pollution, a state-of-the-art model to predict wildfire smoke and a project to study the climate impact of melting permafrost.
Reducing funding for coastal research and grant programs that prepare communities for rising seas and worsening storms by $250 million.
Eliminating the Global Climate Change Initiative.
Eliminating the Surface Geology and Biology mission that keeps track of methane and carbon pollution.
Eliminating the next generation of the LandSat satellite program. LandSat tracks the ways global warming is altering Earth and also provides data on water levels and distribution.
This is just an incredibly small subset of examples of cuts being made through Trump’s budget to combat climate change. There is a lot more.
The Bottom line
Global warming is occurring. Full stop. It is mostly caused by human activity. Full stop. Over time it will exacerbate migration across borders, hunger among people and conflict and violence among nations. Full stop. Our children and our children’s children will pay the costs (social, economic and political) of our inaction. Full Stop.
And Trump doesn’t care. Because he only cares about himself. Full stop.