hey folk, I'm going to talk a bit about the BIF that passed last night, White House spin, and whether it's a climate bill or not. And I'm going to tag it #325To1 for reasons that will become obvious.
But if you don't have time to read the whole thread, here's the short version. You can call money for roads "resilience" and sell it as a climate bill, or you can just call it an old fashioned "infrastructure" bill. #325To1
The White House and its friends are touting historical climate investments in the BIF. Fact sheet on reducing GHG emission in public transit, EV chargers, grid, etc. #325To1 bit.ly/3EOU98z
and in fact you can read it on twitter rather than clicking thru... #325To1
https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1456948009938440197
But. And there's a huge but. Here's a LOT of other stuff that is in the BIF but the WH is not telling you about. #325To1
1. $937M over 4 years for carbon capture and storage large scale pilot program. #325To1
2. $2.537 billion over 4 years for carbon capture and storage demonstration program. #325To1
3. $115M for direct air capture prizes. (this is the idea that we can put a magic damper on top of every coal plant to capture CO2 emissions, and it's...ah...purely magical thinking right now, hence the prize money) #325To1
4. $6 billion in subsidies for nuclear reactors that are not economic in today's markets. #325To1
5. Another $3.5 billion to establish four regional DAC hubs (see above for comment on magical thinking of DAC) #325To1
6. $2.1B for "carbon dioxide transportation infrastructure finance and innvovation," which generally seems to be S. 799 by Sen Chris Coons, and I have no idea what all that noun string word salad means #325To1
7. Oh, and $60M for wind and $40M for solar, both R&D and recycling, that's it, same amount for wind and solar put together as DAC prize money for one year. #325To1
8. I appreciate the WH correctly noting that all this BIF is just a warmup and the main act is BBB. And I also appreciate all the Dem gloating over the fact that "infrastructure week" turned into a Trump era joke while Dems actually got stuff done. BUT... #325To1
9. What I do not appreciate is spin that the BIF is a climate bill. #325To1
10. Analyst @JesseJenkins sums it up: BIF barely moves needle on climate.
#325To1
https://twitter.com/JesseJenkins/status/1456960239056654343
#325To1
12. As for my obscure-sounding hashtag, the DNC voted on a resolution authored by chair Jaime Harrison (with likely White House work) praising BIF as a climate bill. It passed, 325 to 1. That 1 was me. #RLM4DNC #325To1
In conclusion, I'm begging the White House to stop greenwashing a common or garden variety infrastructure bill and calling it a climate bill. It's ok to celebrate passing it. It's ok (and in fact NECESSARY) to demand #BuildBackBetter alongside. But don't spin. #325To1
thanks for listening y'all, and especially thx to @JesseJenkins for this spreadsheet bit.ly/2YnAYTR
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