Obama is brave – but King Coal has already lost its crown
US conservative commentators are right: President Barack Obama has declared war on coal. But despite their fury, the US is a long way from getting really tough on greenhouse gases.
You don’t need to take Mr Obama’s word for it that he has finally delivered on his pledge to act on global warming. The reaction from conservative politicians says it all.
“Today’s announcement is a dagger in the heart of the American middle class, and to representative democracy itself,” said Republican senate leader Mitch McConnell.
He’s from the coal rich state of Kentucky. Political reaction to the president’s plans was similar in other coal-rich states like West Virginia, Wyoming and Indiana.
By taking a stand on emissions from the most carbon-polluting power plants, President Obama has taken two very important steps.
First, he’s helped reduce the carbon emissions of the US – which are second only to China. Second, he’s sent a clear message to the rest of the world that the US is delivering on commitments to reduce global warming.
The timing of that is significant as the world prepares for a new global climate deal in Paris next year.
But while it may have been hard politically, the move won’t cause the economic damage some have suggested, nor will it lead to globally significant reductions in greenhouse gases.
Cheaper “fracked” gas was well on its way on its way to replacing “king coal” anyway. And the US is happily exporting coal to places like the UK, where gas is more expensive.
The fracking boom has also reduced US carbon emissions significantly too. This, combined with the recession, has meant America has cut emissions by between 10 per cent and 15 per cent on 2005 levels already. So there isn’t really that much further to go to meet the President’s 2030 target of 30 per cent – and not much economic pain.
In fact, Mr Obama’s new plans go little further than existing commitments already made. At the Copenhagen climate summit in 2009 the US pledged to cut its national emissions by 17 per cent (of 2005 levels) by 2020.
To meet that total, the energy generation sector was going to have to cut emissions by around 25 per cent anyway.
Viewed in that light, today’s announcement is not that ambitious. It will require power companies to cut emissions by a further 5 per cent or so by 2030. That’s a target they’d likely achieve by natural replacement of inefficient plants by new ones.
The consensus scientific view is that to reduce the risk of more than two degrees of global warming will require global emissions to peak in 2020 before falling significantly year on year. Today’s proposals won’t even be in force until 2016 and take longer to deliver real cuts.
For these reasons, today’s moves by President Obama aren’t a major new step in carbon reduction. But in a country so deeply divided over the impact of climate change and how to address it, even a small step is a significant one.
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