Welcome to the second edition of the 350 Newsletter. There’s plenty to talk about so let’s get into it.

Local

First Street Foundation, a NY based non-profit, recently released a study on the future of climate change in the U.S. In it they outline the “Extreme Heat Belt”, areas of the country that will have temperatures consistently above 125 degrees Fahrenheit by 2050. Illinois is among the listed states. Mind you, the human body can only survive in temperatures of around 95 degrees Fahrenheit. Within our lifetimes, our state could become uninhabitable.

All that said, there’s still plenty of reason to be hopeful about the future. More and more people are starting to take climate change seriously. Another university has stepped up and decided to divest from fossil fuels, adding to a long list of institutions, and a Global Climate Strike is coming to Chicago. Not enough people are taking climate change seriously. If they were, then they wouldn’t still be investing in fossil fuels at a time like this. We plan to protest and force their hand. If you want to be part of the movement for securing our future you can RSVP here.

State Divestment Campaign Update

Our state divestment campaign has a draft bill to divest the state’s funds and pension funds from the top 200 oil, coal and natural gas companies. We are reviewing the bill with the Illinois Environmental Council (IEC), who will also help us find a chief sponsor for our legislation. We are currently reaching out to other groups to support our campaign. In the next month we will begin setting up meetings with legislators to gain their support. Join us every other Monday from 7:30pm - 8:30pm to work on our campaign. We meet via Zoom but hope to meet in person again soon.

National

It’s about damn time!

Congress has finally decided to do something about climate change. The Inflation Reduction Act is a solid piece of legislation that helps us carve out a path to progress. Many will claim that the legislation is inadequate to fully address climate change, and they’re right. The legislation doesn’t do enough to fight or remedy the climate catastrophe.

However….

This bill is the beginning of a serious effort to finally address the potential world-ender in front of us. It’s harder to reverse progress once it has been made and this legislation will only be followed by more serious and continued effort to reverse the damage we’ve done to the planet. Below we’ve outlined some of the major parts of the bill and how they’ll impact you.

Inflation Reduction Act

The United States recently passed a massive, historic climate bill that experts say will cut US carbon emissions by 40% of 2005 levels. More importantly, this reduction will be achieved in seven years by 2030. Several analysts reviewed the legislation. According to Inside Climate News, “Environmental analysts at Energy Innovation , Rhodium Group and Princeton University’s REPEAT program all have concluded that the law will help bring U.S. greenhouse gas emissions about 40 percent below 2005 levels by 2030.” The Inflation Reduction Act will spend 269 billion dollars to put the US on a path to meet its obligations under the Paris Accords, which Biden had previously pushed to 50% emission cuts in GHG. Scientists at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have warned that if the world has a hope of keeping warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius (we are at about 1.1 now), the world needs to cut its emissions by 42% by 2030. Despite some drawback concessions made to the oil industry, the Inflation Reduction Act puts the USA on track to reach that remarkable achievement.

Tax Incentives for Consumers and Businesses

The bill creates production tax credits for clean hydrogen, nuclear power and new manufacturing production credits for wind and solar. The law also extends the $7,500 consumer tax credit for new EVs ten years, now awarding the money at point of sale. Consumers will also see tax credits for installing geothermal heat pumps, installing solar panels, making their homes more energy efficient and even for installing emission free appliances like electric stoves. In addition, the law forces oil companies to finally pay a fine for allowing old oil wells to leak methane. Rural areas will see investment as well as 24.9 billion dollars will go to “farmers, ranchers, and forest landowners adopt climate-smart conservation practices that enhance landscape resilience. Investments support access to the robust technical assistance resources that enable meaningful adoption of natural climate solutions, including activities that improve soil carbon storage or decrease emissions of nitrous oxide or other GHGs, including practices to reduce enteric methane emissions” (Inflation Reduction Act Summary: Energy and Climate Provisions | Bipartisan Policy Center)  

Spur to Private Investments

Perhaps the most important aspect of the law will be how it will spur new investors to get in on the energy transition in a substantial way. Investors dislike uncertainty and will often hold fire until governments make their long term direction clear. Biden has done this with the IRA and experts believe the money from investors will now come pouring in. According to Carmichael Roberts, co-leader of the investment committee at Breakthrough Energies Ventures, “Everybody wants to be part of this. The calls that I’m getting now — tremendous, already, and there was already a big groundswell around climate, but this just really boosted even further.”

Energy Costs Savings for Consumers

The law will also reduce energy prices for Americans, which is desperately needed with the recent spike in gas prices and high inflation. Resources for the Future predicts the consumer costs of electricity to grow 5 to 7 percent in the next 10 years. This drop will save consumers between 209 to 279 billion dollars.

Other Features of the Inflation Reduction Act

There are so many programs and features to this bill it cannot be summarized in a newsletter. The act provides money to help tribal communities switch to renewable energy as well as money to help address the damages the climate crisis has already wrought on tribal lands. The Act provides billions for planting trees, creating new forests. The bill will create at least 1.5 million jobs, and provide a boost to American manufacturing, as the law requires that for many of these tax incentives to apply, the majority of metals need to be mined in North America, and batteries need to be made in the United States. In addition, the act provides money for research and development for making green heavy duty industry, aviation and for developing affordable, scalable carbon capture technology, a technology scientists say we will need, because even if we end all GHG emissions today, the world would still keep warming. We need to draw down the legacy load of carbon already in the atmosphere as well in order to finally halt global warming.

Certainly not all climate activists are completely happy with this bill. Again, we have to bend the knee to fossil fuel industries in order to get anything done. Some would have liked to have seen more elements of the Green New Deal in the law, while others would have liked to see the end to US federal subsidies of fossil fuel companies.

What do you like most about this bill? And what do you feel we still need to do in order to win this fight?