GR: Here’s a review of the national benefits Trump is scrapping along with the Clean Power Plan. The con game run by the fossil-fuel industry is bearing fat fruit with this new president.
“Decades of progress on cleaning up our dirty air took a significant hit on Tuesday, along with hopes for a livable future climate, when President Trump issued his Energy Independence Executive Order. Most seriously, the order attacks the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) Clean Power Plan, which requires a 32 percent reduction in CO2 emissions from existing power plants by 2030 (compared to 2005 emission rates.) — Dr Jeff Masters
“Yesterday, Donald Trump, much like that famous Luddite Don Quixote, decided to go to war with clean energy. But unlike Don Quixote, Trump did so with full knowledge that he was also fighting to rob us of our best hopes of putting millions of Americans to work for clean air and a livable climate.
Where would you want to live? Downwind of a toxin spewing coal plant, or near solar panels and wind turbines? Poor coal miners basically a set piece in Trump’s effort to save coal profits at the cost of the environment. Coal company CEOs have already signaled that the coal jobs aren’t coming back due to automation.
“With executive order #18 from his administration, he began to lay the groundwork to start to unravel Obama’s Clean Power Plan — which made a decent first shot at removing the worst U.S. polluters, prevented about 4,500 premature deaths each year (which is like preventing a pollution 9/11 every six months), promoted a jobs-growing renewable energy revolution, and put the U.S. on track to become a global leader in the fight to prevent some of the worst impacts of climate change.
If you want to grow jobs in the U.S., replacing dirty energy with clean energy is a good way to do it. But Trump is doing just the opposite. Source: Political Economy Research Institute.
“As Trump favors coal over renewable energy, and since every dollar spent on renewable energy creates twice the number of jobs for every dollar spent on fossil fuels, his action will almost certainly result in job losses across the energy sector. In West Virginia, for example, many coal jobs have already been replaced by automation and even coal executives now say those jobs aren’t coming back.” –Robert Scribbler (Continue: Trump’s Attack on Clean Power Threatens Livable Climate, Public Health, and Hundreds of Thousands of Energy Jobs | robertscribbler.)
GarryRogers Nature Conservation 
Talk about the blind leading the blind. Those who voted for this selfish greedy elderly child are going to be sorely disappointed – soon I hope!
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Trump’s support is falling. His Russia dealings may provide an opportunity to kick him out, but as I look down the row of succession, I see no one that would repeal his attacks on environmental policy. Harmful changes would continue. The Vice President, the Speaker of the House, President pro tempore of the Senate, and the Secretary of State would be no improvement and would probably complete further changes more quickly than Trump.
Nature conservation is in a bad place. Conservative and liberal leaders and governments everywhere are now the paid representatives of big business. In cases such as Russia, governments and businesses are almost indistinguishable.
As people react to conservative extremes and the loss of individual freedom, progressives that wish to elect replacements for the kleptocrats are gaining supporters. So far, poor coordination between groups is weakening efforts. However, even if they succeed, none of the U. S. groups I’ve reviewed has adequate environmental plans. They appear to lack ecological comprehension, and apart from the single issue of climate change, they aren’t proposing significant actions. Our species’ needs are important, but we will not survive if we do not recognize and defend the needs of other species.
There are many great conservation organizations such as the Audubon Society, Center for Biological Conservation, Defenders of Wildlife, Greenpeace, and the Sierra Club, but they are no match for today’s governments. Though they have many members, and work hard on many projects, all the indicators of Earth systems stability are falling. The organizations are slowing the fall, but they can’t stop it.
The populist backlash that gave us Trump is fading. Now we need a coalescence of progressive political groups with nature-conservation organizations. We need an alliance of all those concerned people to build a strong nature-focused electorate. If we can’t focus our efforts, we are likely to continue steadily destroying the best qualities of the Earth.
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Reblogged this on nuclear-news.
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