GOP governors confront rising sea levels and wildfires: ‘We’re not doing any left-wing stuff,’ Florida’s Ron DeSantis says

By Ariane Campo-Floreshttps://www.wsj.com/articles/republicans-focus-on-effects-not-causes-of-climate-change-11642950002

“What I’ve found is people, when they start talking about things like global warming, they usually use it to mean a bunch of left-wing things,” Mr. DeSantis said at the event. “We’re not doing any left-wing stuff.”

Governors and lawmakers in several Republican-led states, including Idaho, South Carolina and Texas, are taking a similar approach to concerns about climate change. Research shows that after natural disasters are becoming more frequent and intensifying, they are taking measures such as infrastructure upgrades to reduce floods, wildfires and severe storms. They say such steps are important for the economic livelihood of their states.

As in Florida, in most cases the focus is on adaptation. A spokesman for Mr DeSantis did not respond to requests for comment.

In the past two years, the US has experienced the highest annual highs Billion Dollar Weather Disasters Since 1980—when the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration began compiling such records—with 22 in 2020 and 20 in 2021. The government agency has said that the warming climate is a significant contributor.

a December analysis of five surveys Researchers at Florida Atlantic University concluded that the share of self-identified Florida Republicans who say they believe in climate change rose 5 percentage points to 88% in the nearly two years beginning October 2019, while increased by 1 percentage point to 96% for the state’s self-identified Democrats. 

Nearly half of Republicans said climate change was caused by human activity, compared to three-quarters of Democrats.

Prominent Democratic governors often talk about climate change and back policies aimed at limiting or eliminating emissions. In his budget blueprint presented earlier this month, California Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, pledged $9.1 billion to advance clean-transit initiatives to reduce emissions and help transition to zero-emissions vehicles. proposed for $6.1 billion. In a budget presentation last week, Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York promoted a $4 billion bond measure that would partially fund climate-change mitigation projects.

At the Oldsmar event, Mr. DeSantis outlined a proposal to dedicate more than $270 million to 76 projects aimed at strengthening protection against rising sea levels and flooding. “We are a low-lying state, we are a hurricane-prone state, and we are a flood-prone state,” he said.

In South Carolina, a series of devastating storms, including Hurricane Matthew and Hurricane Florence, prompted Republican Governor Henry McMaster to form a flood water commission to develop recommendations for mitigating the effects of floods in 2018. Last year he named Ben Duncan to head a new Office of Resilience, which is managing funds to provide disaster relief and buy flooded properties and creating a statewide resilience plan.

The office aims to strengthen protection in coastal and low-lying areas, not to address factors that contribute to severe flooding, such as greenhouse-gas emissions. “We are focusing on the effects rather than the causes,” said resilience planning director Alex Butler.

Jason Crowley, a senior program director for the South Carolina Coastal Conservation League, said an informal understanding between environmental groups and Republican elected officials has led to a focus on addressing the climate crisis rather than debating its causes to work on policy gains. paved the way for.

“We’ve been able to cut that noise,” he said. “In South Carolina, we have a problem, and we have to do something about it.”

At the federal level, Rep. John Curtis (R., Utah) led the creation of the Conservative Climate Caucus, which now has more than 70 GOP members of Congress and emphasizes private sector innovation to reduce emissions.

Some environmental advocates say elected officials who do not link the effects of climate change to the underlying causes are failing to fully address the problem. “We have to not only build resilience, but slow the pace of those impacts in the future,” said Nat Keohen, president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, an environmental-policy think tank.

In Louisiana, a state hit by rising sea levels with significant oil and gas production, Democratic Governor John Bel Edwards convened a task force that earlier this month called for a plan to reach net zero greenhouse-gas emissions. submitted its final draft of the Climate Action Plan. 2050. It sought to address both the causes and effects of climate change through proposals such as generating electricity from renewable resources.

“The more we do against climate change, the more effective our restoration and protection projects are,” said task force chairman Harry Vorhoff.

Some of its recommendations would require action by the Republican-led state legislature. Eddie Lambert, the GOP chairman of the Environmental-Quality Committee, said he is open to considering its recommendations, but is wary of cutting oil and gas production altogether. Still, he said, the effects of global warming demand a response.

He said, “Climate change is caused by us or is a natural phenomenon, it is happening.”–

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People under 40 will experience ‘unprecedented life’ of climate change disasters, study says.

https://news.yahoo.com › people-under-40-experience-…

Sep 28, 2021 — People under 40 will experience ‘unprecedented life’ of climate change disasters, study says.

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Majority of US Population Now Under Age 40 – VOA Learning …

https://learningenglish.voanews.com › study-majority-o…Aug 13, 2020 — A new study shows that Americans under the age of 40 now make up a majority of the U.S. population.