In The Shadows ...

Breathe Easy ...

June 14, 2018. Day 1.

Where to start? Now I'm not a tree-hugger (well, there is that clump birch ... but that's not for here 🤣) but like most folks, the environment and what we're doing to it is a concern more for my grandkids than me. Hell, I've been a smoker for 50 years so I wouldn't know clean air if it bit me. 😋

Certainly, Trump's pulling out of the Paris Accords was a major headline and most of you will remember it. Unfortunately, Trump's done more than that.

The WHAT: The EPA (under the stellar direction of Scott Pruitt) announced in April that it will revoke Obama-era standards requiring cars and light trucks sold in the United States to average more than 50 miles per gallon by 2025, a move that could change the composition of the nation’s auto fleet for years. More than that, he has threatened to revoke California's waiver to impose their own, higher standards. The California waiver gives the state considerable power to require automakers to stick to stricter standards. Not only is California a huge car market itself, but 12 other states including New York, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania have historically followed its lead. Together they represent more than a third of the domestic auto market.

The IMPACT: The CAFE standards (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) were put in place to curb climate change and limit environmental pollution. By lowering the standards, we're obviously NOT curbing and limiting. I guess the argument for "states rights" touted by the Republicans is going to be reinterpreted as well. 🤪

This is only one of the "in the shadows" moves that will affect our environment in the future. For example:

~ After pledging that the remaining $2 billion of a $3 billion pledge by President Barack Obama to the United Nation's Green Climate Fund would not be delivered during his presidency, President Trump revealed in G20 negotiations that the US would use its influence on a 24-member board to steer the previously donated $1 bn toward fossil fuel-related projects.

~ We may never know what the impact of this is. Trump has ended NASA's Carbon Monitoring System, a $10-million-per-year effort to fund pilot programs intended to improve the monitoring of global carbon emissions.

I leave you with this thought: "If you are not part of the solution, you must be part of the problem." This is a misquotation of Eldridge Cleaver but it's close enough. 😅