Sign In or Create an Account.

By continuing, you agree to the Terms of Service and acknowledge our Privacy Policy

Climate

What a Trump Victory Could Mean for Climate Policy

On the election stakes, Greenland's thaw, and butterfly wings

What a Trump Victory Could Mean for Climate Policy
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Current conditions: Parts of Indonesia are under water due to heavy rainfall • Tree branches are heavy with ice in Oregon • A no-burn alert is in place for Southern California as an atmospheric “lid” locks in smog.

THE TOP FIVE

1. Kerry warns U.S. election stakes for climate policy are ‘as high as they can get’

As election season heats up and a certain bombastic former president looks to take back the White House in November, conversation has turned to what a second Trump presidency could mean for climate policy. Trump has promised to gut the Inflation Reduction Act and cut funding for climate adaptation in poorer countries, among other things. What would his return really mean for the climate movement on a national and global scale? Here’s a quick opinion roundup:

  • The stakes couldn’t be higher: Trump won’t be able to stop the green energy transition that’s already underway, but he could slow it down, U.S. Climate Envoy John Kerry told Bloomberg TV. “The marketplace is going to support this transition and it’s irrevocable now — we’re going to get there. The only question is if we’re going to get there in time to not be ravaged by the worst consequences of the climate crisis.”
  • Gutting the IRA would be very unpopular: Many clean-energy programs funded by President Biden’s signature climate bill are in red states, noted The Economist. If Trump nixes them, “he may face pushback from his own party,” not to mention business leaders. Some automakers, like GM and Nissan, are already warning against the move.
  • Trump can’t stop the global momentum: Of course the U.S. president’s views on climate matter, but “the world’s in a slightly different place than it was five years ago,” World Bank President Ajay Banga told Politico. The bank helps finance climate adaptation in developing countries, and is pushing for more private sector investment in renewables. Banga suggested international momentum on these issues is “much bigger than just the U.S. and the EU.”

Side note: New research from the University of Colorado at Boulder concludes that concerns about climate change have “a significant and growing effect on voting that favors the Democrats” and “that climate change opinion probably cost Republicans the 2020 presidential election, all else being equal.”

2. The South smashes electricity records

The Tennessee Valley Authority, America’s largest public power company, just set a new record for electricity usage thanks to the cold weather system hammering huge sections of the country, reports Heatmap’s Matthew Zeitlin. Consumers used around 34,500 megawatts of electricity yesterday morning, about 1,000 megawatts more than its previous all-time record of around 33,500 megawatts in August 2007. Like much of the region, Tennesseans largely heat their homes using electricity as opposed to fuel oil or natural gas. Cold mornings are particularly challenging for the authority because lots of people are trying to heat their chilly homes between waking up and going to work or school. “By contrast, summer afternoons and early evenings are tough for grids to manage because temperatures stay high even as the sun goes down and people return to their homes and cool them and start operating appliances,” Zeitlin explains. The cold snap is expected to last through the weekend.

3. Study: Greenland is losing way more ice than experts thought

The Greenland ice sheet has lost 20% more ice than scientists previously thought due to global warming, according to new research published in the journal Nature. The researchers came to this conclusion by looking at the amount of glacial ice lost around the edges of the sheet, an area that earlier estimates overlooked. Experts worry the huge amounts of fresh water pouring into the north Atlantic could disrupt ocean currents and wreak havoc on global weather patterns.

Get Heatmap AM directly in your inbox every morning:

* indicates required
  • 4. Warmer temperatures could change butterfly wing patterns

    Butterflies may lose their spotty wings thanks to climate change, scientists say. The new research focuses on female meadow brown butterflies, and finds that insects that developed in warmer temperatures had fewer spots than those that developed in cooler weather. "This is an unexpected consequence of climate change,” said Richard ffrench-Constant, a professor of molecular natural history at the University of Exeter in the U.K. “We tend to think about species moving north, rather than changing appearance."

    5. Scientists urge swift climate action ahead of EU elections

    The European Union needs to double down on plans to phase out fossil fuels and implement green policies if it wants to reach its 2050 net zero targets, a report from the European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change said. "The EU needs to sharply decrease the use of fossil fuels, and almost fully phase out the use of coal and fossil gas in public electricity and heat generation by 2040," the advisers said. The report urges the EU to work quickly to put planned climate policies into law. The timing of the report is interesting because, as the Financial Times explained, the EU faces parliamentary elections this summer, “when rightwing parties that want to slow the pace of progress are expected to focus on rhetoric about the social costs of switching away from fossil fuels to combat climate change.”

    THE KICKER

    “As the EV transition continues, we are going to have to think about [EVs] more as products, as specific tools that can improve someone’s life by their presence.”Heatmap’s Robinson Meyer on the secrets to selling electric cars

    Yellow

    You’re out of free articles.

    Subscribe today to experience Heatmap’s expert analysis 
of climate change, clean energy, and sustainability.
    To continue reading
    Create a free account or sign in to unlock more free articles.
    or
    Please enter an email address
    By continuing, you agree to the Terms of Service and acknowledge our Privacy Policy
    Politics

    Trump Opened a Back Door to Kill Wind and Solar Tax Credits

    The Senate told renewables developers they’d have a year to start construction and still claim a tax break. Then came an executive order.

    Trump burning a calendar.
    Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

    Renewable energy advocates breathed a sigh of relief after a last-minute change to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act stipulated that wind and solar projects would be eligible for tax credits as long as they began construction within the next 12 months.

    But the new law left an opening for the Trump administration to cut that window short, and now Trump is moving to do just that. The president signed an executive order on Monday directing the Treasury Department to issue new guidance for the clean electricity tax credits “restricting the use of broad safe harbors unless a substantial portion of a subject facility has been built.”

    Keep reading...Show less
    Sparks

    Trump Says He’s Going to Slap a Huge Tariff on Copper

    “I believe the tariff on copper — we’re going to make it 50%.”

    Donald Trump.
    Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

    President Trump announced Tuesday during a cabinet meeting that he plans to impose a hefty tax on U.S. copper imports.

    “I believe the tariff on copper — we’re going to make it 50%,” he told reporters.

    Keep reading...Show less
    Green
    Climate

    The Only Weather Models That Nailed the Texas Floods Are on Trump’s Chopping Block

    Predicting the location and severity of thunderstorms is at the cutting edge of weather science. Now funding for that science is at risk.

    Texas flooding.
    Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

    Tropical Storm Barry was, by all measures, a boring storm. “Blink and you missed it,” as a piece in Yale Climate Connections put it after Barry formed, then dissipated over 24 hours in late June, having never sustained wind speeds higher than 45 miles per hour. The tropical storm’s main impact, it seemed at the time, was “heavy rains of three to six inches, which likely caused minor flooding” in Tampico, Mexico, where it made landfall.

    But a few days later, U.S. meteorologists started to get concerned. The remnants of Barry had swirled northward, pooling wet Gulf air over southern and central Texas and elevating the atmospheric moisture to reach or exceed record levels for July. “Like a waterlogged sponge perched precariously overhead, all the atmosphere needed was a catalyst to wring out the extreme levels of water vapor,” meteorologist Mike Lowry wrote.

    Keep reading...Show less
    Blue