Letters to the Editor: Fossil-fuel polluters put money over the planet. Tax them into smithereens
Each one of us is having a life of previously unknown riches, all brought by the burning of fossil fuels. The relentless use of fossil fuels created the monster that is climate change, and now it will be our salvation.
Tax the fossil fuel industry and its financiers to smithereens. This dramatic action will fund the transition to sustainable economies run on renewables and help the families suffering losses from all extreme weather events. We can do this. We must do this.
We only need to stop listening to people who somehow imagine money is more important than the very planet that sustains us. As Thomas points out, climate change disasters are only growing in intensity, destruction and frequency, and these people need to realize they (and their children) will either die out in an increasingly damaged environment, or they will join us. Those are the only two choices.
One way or another, we will stop pouring carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Mother Earth will not let us destroy her.
JJ Flowers, Dana Point
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To the editor: Just 20,000 years ago, much of North America was buried under an ice sheet that reached Nebraska. Pacific Palisades now resembles cities firebombed in World War II. This is the power of the atmosphere, which exceeds that unleashed in any world war.
U.S. leaders, influenced by oil money, have consistently shirked their duty to protect us from polluters. We must marshal a national mindset appropriate to what we have known about climate change since the 1980s.
Don't be distracted or deflected by cynical nonsense. Become a political 'intensifier.' Demand that your congressional representatives ambitiously respond to climate change, regardless of how much the fossil fuel industry donates to their campaigns. Any lawmaker voting to weaken or dismantle the Inflation Reduction Act should lose their next election.
Gary Stewart, Laguna Beach
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Indianapolis Star
4 hours ago
- Indianapolis Star
Critics said Trump would ruin America. Six months in, he's proving them wrong.
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Forbes
9 hours ago
- Forbes
Trump Shouldn't Let Big Beautiful Bill Boost China's Clean Energy Edge
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The sweeping, nearly 1,000-page OBBB brings significant changes to IRA provisions that prioritized clean energy investments and manufacturing in the U.S. over other options. The OBBB sets a placed-in-service deadline for wind and solar projects, making any project that started a year after the IRA became law ineligible for tax unless it is placed in service before the end of 2027. This will create additional risks for projects grappling with supply chain delays and complex permitting and construction timelines. Many developers may decide to turn down new projects rather than trying to race against the regulatory clock. On the other hand, metallurgical coal, which is used in steelmaking, will now qualify for tax credits. Besides this being contradictory to the OBBB's goal of making needed budget cuts, it also works against innovation, providing credits to coal at the expense of developing a green steel industry. 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Although this aims to reduce supply chain dependence on China and prevent Chinese companies from benefiting from subsidies, the complexity and uncertainty around how to actually apply these provisions for clean energy projects means these rules can backfire, reducing domestic clean energy production and innovation and sharpening the competitive edge of Chinese alternatives, helping Beijing to become even more dominant in the global market. Can the OBBB Help American Manufacturing? Policy uncertainty has chilling effects on investment, and as far as the OBBB, this is already happening. According to E2, since January 2025, over $14 billion in clean energy projects and more than 10,000 announced jobs had been cancelled before the Senate even passed the bill. 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President Trump's energy priorities surround taking advantage of the United States' advantageous ... More position in the oil and gas sectors, but renewable development is necessary to remain competitive and pursue energy dominance. While the OBBB is focused on rolling back IRA measures that put the green transition ahead of America's advantages and interests in the energy space, its provisions risk making the U.S. less competitive as China and other powers strive to advance renewables and their associated technologies. The Trump Administration is seeking to ensure a modern workforce and achieving energy dominance in the long term, so it needs to start investing in the future, which will include the energy industries the president has already prioritized, as well as those currently dominated by China. Exceling on all fronts will serve America's interests better than abandoning certain key arenas to the key geo-economic competition of the 21st century.
Yahoo
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- Yahoo
Trump fossil-fuel push setting back green progress decades, critics warn
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That order came days after Trump signed his One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which included provisions to gut big tax credits for green energy contained in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act legislation Congress passed during Joe Biden's presidency In another oddly timed move, underscoring the administration's war on science, its proposed budget for the coming fiscal year would shutter 10 labs that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration runs – specifically ones that conduct key research on ways weather changes are affected by a warming earth. Trump also signed four executive orders in April to help revive the beleaguered and polluting coal industry, which he and key cabinet members touted more at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh as they promoted plans by private companies to spend $92bn on AI projects and expand coal and natural gas in Pennsylvania. The blinkered focus that Trump and his key regulators place on their energy policies reflect the administration's denigration of science, while posing dangers to public health and scientific progress. And, critics say, this is all happening as university research and government labs face big cutbacks in funding and staff. Trump has pushed for more fossil-fuel production, rhapsodized about 'beautiful coal', dubbed climate change a 'hoax' and invoked his 'drill, baby, drill' mantra to promote more oil and gas projects after receiving $75m in campaign donations in 2024 from fossil-fuel interests. Scholars have hit out at the administration for firing hundreds of scientists and experts working on a major federal report detailing how climate change is impacting the country. The administration has also systematically deleted mentions of climate change from federal websites while cutting back funds for global warming research. 'Trump's actions are a patent attempt to roll back decades of environmental progress, not because it makes any sense, economically, but because it does two things that Trump wants,' Naomi Oreskes, a Harvard historian of science, told the Guardian 'First, it helps his cronies in the oil, gas and coal industries, who we know he met with a Mar-a-Lago before the election, and who gave substantial sums to his election campaign.' Oreskes said it's also 'part of a larger attempt to deny the credibility of environmental protection, tout court'. 'Look at Trump trying to force uneconomic coal fired power plants to stay open,' she continued. 'That makes no economic sense, and defies the principles of free market economics that Republicans claim to support. But like the guys who jack up their trucks to make more pollution, Trump is trying to deny the necessity and credibility of environmental concerns.' Oreskes stressed that much of the science Trump 'is in the process of destroying forms the basis for environmental and public health protection in this country: the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the US Geological Survey and the EPA, plus all the federally funded science at universities across the country, including my home institution, Harvard. None of this makes economic sense.' Many scientists echo Oreskes's concerns as do Democratic attorneys general, who filed a lawsuit in May challenging the legality of the Trump administration's declaration of a national 'energy emergency' to justify its radical policies. Meanwhile, regulatory and spending shifts at the Environmental Protection Agency, including staff and research cuts, have revealed the administration's disregard for scientific evidence – particularly about climate change and its adverse economic effects. In response to the cuts and policy shifts, a total of 278 EPA employees signed a letter in July denouncing the agency's politicization and decrying policies that 'undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment'. The EPA then put 144 of the employees who signed their names to the letter on leave for two weeks while an 'administrative investigation' was conducted. 'This isn't quite at the level of the 17th-century church's persecution of Galileo for saying the Earth goes around the Sun, but it's in a similar spirit of ideology trying to squelch science,' Michael Gerrard, who heads the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University, told the Guardian. 'Trump's use of an invented 'energy emergency' to justify more fossil-fuel production defies not only physics but arithmetic. The numbers show that the US is producing more oil and gas than any other country, and that Trump's actions in knifing the wind and solar industries will raise the energy prices paid by US consumers.' Gerrard stressed too that, on the Texas flooding, 'the lack of sufficient warnings highlight how short-sighted are Trump's drastic cuts to the National Weather Service and other federal scientific work'. He added it was 'especially so since climate change is intensifying extreme weather events, and Trump's attacks on green energy and support of fossil fuels will make those worse'. Such criticism has not seemed to faze Trump or top agency appointees like EPA administrator Lee Zeldin. Last month, 1,500 staffers who work in EPA's office of research and development (ORD) were told in a staff meeting that they would have to apply for about 400 new posts in other EPA offices. What will happen to employees who don't land new positions is unclear. 'Gutting the … [ORD] is a loss for health,' warned Laura Kate Bender, assistant vice-president of nationwide healthy air at the American Lung Association. Further experts and watchdogs have stressed that the health of millions of Americans was threatened by Zeldin's May announcement of plans to cut its budget by $300m in fiscal year 2026 – a move that's part of a makeover to reduce spending levels to those of the 1980s under Ronald Reagan. In response to the cuts and policy shifts, 278 EPA employees signed a letter in July denouncing the agency's politicization and decrying policies that 'undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment'. The EPA then put 144 of the employees who signed their names to the letter on leave for two weeks while an 'administrative investigation' was conducted. On Friday, the EPA doubled down on the cuts and say it would be reducing its entire workforce by at least 23% through voluntary retirements and layoffs. Gerrard noted that the administration's misguided energy moves and rejection of science are having enormous societal costs: 'Laboratories are being shut down around the country, experiments that might be on the cusp of great discoveries are being halted, and young aspiring scientists are rethinking their career paths. Other countries are recruiting US scientists and offering them friendlier environments.' Looking ahead, Oreskes, too, warns that the Trump administration's denigration of science will do long term damage to public health, the environment and scientific progress 'The scientific agencies that Trump is destroying, such as the National Weather Service, save the American people and American business billions of dollars in avoided property damage and health costs,' she said. 'But if you want to deny the true costs of climate change, then you may be motivated to destroy the agency that documents these costs [Noaa]. And if you want to deny the need for environmental and public health protection, then an effective way to do that is to destroy the scientific agencies and academic research that for decades have proven that need.'
