Above, pathetic tap dance by Florida Senator Rick Scott in response to climate change questions following Hurricane Helene.
Might as well get used to it.
Republicans are so dug in on climate denial that not even a series of punishing, climate enhanced disasters can move them.
After Hurricanes Helene and Milton devastated huge swaths of the Southwest and continue to stress the limits of federal disaster relief coffers, Republicans are by and large still not ready to change the way they react and respond to natural disasters, which studies show to be growing in both intensity and frequency as global warming persists.
Their reasons range broadly from questioning the science to offering solutions different to what advocates and other experts say is needed. Most Republicans don’t see climate change as a crisis and the storms aren’t changing that.
“As Governor [Ron] DeSantis noted … major hurricanes are a natural phenomenon that have been a part of Florida life dating back to the 1800s,” said Rep. Daniel Webster (R-Fla.), whose district was affected by both storms.
Webster was one of 42 GOP members of the House and Senate contacted by POLITICO’s E&E News this week, asking if they believed the severity of the storms were exacerbated by global warming and if those storms would motivate lawmakers to endorse reducing greenhouse gas emissions — many of them from burning fossil fuels — that scientists call the major cause of climate change.
Among the Republicans contacted were lawmakers from affected districts and states, and the chair and five vice-chairs of the House Conservative Climate Caucus, which purports to subscribe to the belief that “the climate is changing, and decades of a global industrial era … has also contributed to that change.”
In the end, only three House Republicans and one Republican senator — Marco Rubio of Florida — responded to the requests. None of them attributed the strength of the storms to climate change.
“Congresswoman Mace is a strong advocate for bipartisan action on extreme weather and clean energy, but she’s also clear-eyed about Biden-Harris and the Left’s reckless climate spending,” said Gabrielle Lipsky, a spokesperson for Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), who represents coastal Charleston and is a member of the Conservative Climate Caucus.
Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart (R-Fla.), a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee and another member of the Conservative Climate Caucus, in an interview railed against the “fake religion” of climate activism, saying he believed the climate was changing but disagreed that the “billions of dollars” being spent by Democrats to drive down emissions would stop global warming.
“If we literally go to zero fossil fuels in the United States and we’re all riding bicycles, do you know how much that will actually cool the planet and by when?” asked Díaz-Balart, whose South Florida district felt some impacts from the storms.
“It will have zero effect,” he said, arguing that the bulk of global emissions are coming from “Asia, China, India.”
Rubio shared Díaz-Balart’s assessment that until other countries do more to reduce their emissions, the onus should not be on the United States to unilaterally adjust its own behavior. It’s one of the most common GOP arguments against tougher climate action.
“America’s emissions are dropping, but China’s are rising,” Rubio said in a statement. “Let us know when Beijing goes green. Meanwhile, we’re going to focus on recovery efforts here in Florida.”
Then there’s the real world
Yes, China built a lot of coal plants and their annual CO2 emissions are the biggest.
That much is true.
But until 2012 the U.S. was the biggest annual emitter.
The U.S per capita emissions are bigger than China’s
Then there’s cumulative CO2 emissions, the CO2 that has built up in the atmosphere since the industrial revolution,
The U.S. is the biggest cumulative emitter, about 2 times that of China and 8 times that of India.
China wanted to bring their country into the modern world and bring 800 million out of poverty.
They went from generating about 1/6 as much electricity as America in the 1980s, to 1/3 as much in 2000, and now generate 2 times as much as America.
Now their focus is on decarbonizing the grid.
They install about 2/3 of all the solar installed in the world per year. They have 57GW of nuclear, but 609GW of solar and over 400GW of wind energy.
They are BY FAR the world leader in almost every aspect of what a clean energy grid will entail.
In 2023 they installed more solar than the U.S. has ever installed. They have installed 30% of the world’s pumped hydro energy storage, at 50GW with another 89GW under construction
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China installed
Wind — PV Solar — year
72 GW — 48 GW – 2020
37 GW — 87 GW – 2022
76 GW — 216 GW – 2023
total wind 185 GW
total solar 351 GW
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and 62% of all the HVDC long distance transmission capacity in the world. 253GW capacity versus 150GW for the rest of the world combined
They have build about 25,000 miles of electric passenger light rail.
Nearly 1/2 of all BEV car sales are in China.
In two or three years, China will have installed 1,200GW of solar, about 6 years ahead of schedule.
China is now running their coal plants at 50% capacity as grid backup. They are giving electric dispatching priority to solar, wind, hydro and nuclear, with coal last in line.
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Because of all that, international energy watchdogs now think China’s CO2 emissions will peak in the next couple of years, which wasn’t expected until 2035
All good and relevant info. You are missing one big item though: so called industrial nations have outsourced much of their manufacturing to China. China is now responsible for an estimated 35% of global manufacturing. If we produced al the crap we consume, our carbon emissions would probably not be dropping (to the extent that we in fact measure methane emissions)
Just as primaried Republican Congressman Bob Inglis predicted that China would eat our lunch, it’s pretty much turning out that way.
Yes, here we are again.
This parrot is dead.
That does it! I refuse to bail out our lifeboat until I’m sure that everyone is bailing out as much as I do!