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Presented by JBS Foods USA: | | | | | |  | | By Lorraine Woellert and Catherine Boudreau | Presented by JBS Foods USA | | | | | 
Mark Lennihan/AP Photo | WHAT’S THIS GOING TO COST ME? — People are getting nervous about inflation. Consumer prices rose 5.4 percent in September, a big jump driven heavily by energy. The cost of gasoline alone rose more than 42 percent from a year earlier. Americans are worried about climate change, too, and the transition to a green economy will be expensive. The shift to cheaper, cleaner energy is going to cost us, at least in the short term. The pain should recede once we free ourselves of fossil fuels. Work by the nonprofit Resources for the Future suggests that policy measures being debated in Congress are likely to lower electricity costs to consumers . If we do things right, jobs will be created, and efficiencies and technologies will emerge. Of course sun and wind are cheaper than, say, heating oil and gasoline. But it’s not that simple. Transportation, construction and agriculture will have to be retooled. Policies might not go exactly as planned. The costs won’t be trivial, but they won’t necessarily be obvious, either. Call it a kind of hidden inflation. Here are five things to think about. It will be more expensive to pollute. Taxes and regulation will make it more costly to burn fossil fuel. In the near term, that will cut into our pocketbooks, by design. Eventually, though, renewables will power more of our cars, houses and businesses. Some things will cost more. Electric cars remain largely the domain of wealthier urbanites. The cost of new housing could go up , sometimes with little energy savings to show for it. Those are just two examples. We’re replacing things that aren’t broken. It’s not just paying for new wind and solar. There’s also the cost of replacing perfectly good infrastructure because the public demands it. Coal plants still provide power, but we’ve collectively declared them obsolete. “Paid-for stuff is going to be cheaper than buying new stuff,” said Kevin Book, managing director of ClearView Energy Partners, an analytics firm in Washington, D.C. “The things that you would do anyway, that make good economic sense anyway, means the transition can be an economic benefit,” Book said. “The things you do because you’re trying to reduce climate change, because you’re trying to cut emissions, can be very expensive.” Taxpayers will pick up most of the tab. Governments will fund the transition over time. President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better plan is full of industry tax breaks and long-term spending, but it probably won’t affect the daily financial lives of most Americans because the costs will be spread out over decades. “If America feels good about this they may not even call it inflation,” Book said. ”There’s a reasoned argument that the transition benefit is going to be well-received.” Now’s a good time to spend. Government is perhaps the biggest beneficiary of current low interest rates. The cost of borrowing right now is next to nothing, so the timing couldn’t be better for a massive federal intervention in the economy. “It just so happens that the technologies that underpin a clean-energy economy are capital intensive,” said Richard Newell , president and CEO of Resources for the Future. “The cost of capital, the cost of investment is way down. It’s a good time to do this.” | | | What are you willing to pay to fight climate change? Send examples to cboudreau@politico.com and lwoellert@politico.com. Follow us on Twitter @ceboudreau and @Woellert . FOMO? Sign up for The Long Game. Thanks for the help this week, Zack Colman!
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| | | THE BROWN RECOVERY — When the coronavirus pandemic shuttered the global economy, government leaders vowed to unleash unprecedented stimulus spending that would extend a safety net for citizens while greening energy and transportation to fight climate change. It’s been more than 18 months. The grand idea failed. Research from think tanks, consultants and civil society groups show that while trillions of dollars were pumped into the global economy, the spending barely altered the planet’s path to blow through emissions targets that would limit temperature increases to 2 degrees Celsius, let alone the more ambitious goal of 1.5 degrees. Stimulus spending pumped money into coal, oil and natural gas through direct aid and fiscal and monetary policies that were open to all sectors. That helped incumbent industries rather than fund a transformation to a clean economy. The inevitable upshot: Greenhouse gas emissions, which had fallen more than 6 percent in 2020, are up sharply as economies rebound, according to the International Energy Agency. Fossil fuel subsidies will hit a record this year. In one example, the Energy Policy Tracker found that G-20 governments have spent $723 billion on all energy sources through new or amended policies since early 2020. Less than 40 percent of that went to clean energy despite the G-20 adopting Biden’s Build Back Better slogan. “The world missed an opportunity to have a green recovery,” said Alice Hill , who ran climate resilience efforts under President Barack Obama. “We hoped it would. But it didn’t.”
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Sean Gallup/Getty Images | Meeting Paris Agreement goals to reduce emissions will require more mining. Solar panels, wind turbines and batteries will demand four times the current mineral output by 2040, according to the International Energy Agency. The scenario doesn’t exactly conjure up images of climate friendliness. And China currently dominates these supply chains. Researchers at the Wilson Center, a nonpartisan think tank chartered by Congress, have more than a dozen recommendations for shoring up U.S. supply chains of lithium, cobalt and other minerals. Duncan Wood , the center’s vice president for strategy and new initiatives, acknowledged it's an industry-heavy perspective. Major mining and processing companies such as Glencore, Rio Tinto, and Texas Minerals Resources Corp. sponsored the report. Government and academic experts also weighed in. Wood talked with Catherine last week. The interview has been edited for length and clarity. What’s your main takeaway? The Biden administration needs to explicitly recognize that critical minerals are important, not only for U.S. geopolitical and national security goals, but also its climate goals. In order to make the transition to clean energy and cut back on emissions, we need the mining industry to provide us with the resources. This is about growing the pie, not just about shifting away from China. We expect recycling to fulfill some of the demand, but we also need to get more minerals out of the ground. The report advises the mining industry to green its image and tells policymakers to speed up permitting. Are those goals at odds? We’re not talking about greenwashing the mining industry. They need to take this seriously and fix their image by engaging with communities and reassuring them about the environmental impacts of what they do. At a certain point, difficult choices have to be made. If you want access to critical minerals for the energy transition, you have to have mines and processing facilities. It takes seven to 10 years in the U.S. to obtain a permit to mine. In Canada and Australia, it's two years. That’s why our competitiveness has slipped. What can be done on a global scale? The U.S., Canada, and Mexico all have strong mining industries and trade agreements and could be a North American critical minerals platform. A lithium producer in Mexico that was previously owned by a U.K. company was recently sold to China. That should raise eyebrows. There should be intense diplomatic engagement to prevent that from happening again. There also have been diplomatic engagements with Australia to shore up supply chains. We also advise developing an international ESG regime for critical minerals that promotes transparency and disclosure. Let’s raise these standards. | | | | A message from JBS Foods USA:   | | | THE WHITE HOUSE RESPONDS — Mining’s environmental effects disproportionately hurt Native Americans and other Indigenous people. That legacy must be addressed head-on to get buy-in from these groups on policies to boost critical mineral production in the U.S., said Peter Harrell, senior director for international economic affairs at the National Security Council. The Biden administration is taking a “mineral-by-mineral” approach, Harrell said at a Wilson Center event Monday. Lithium, graphite, cobalt, nickel and rare earths are top priorities. The departments of Energy and Defense are investing in pilot projects in mining and processing. A $4 million pilot project in Pennsylvania seeks to recover rare-earth elements from coal ash. The administration is looking into permitting delays, Harrell said. At the same time, mining companies need to engage “early and often” with local communities to avoid lawsuits. That might add six months or a year to the process up front, but can prevent three or four years of litigation, he said.
| | | | A message from JBS Foods USA: The health of the planet directly impacts the health of our food and our communities.
That’s why, at JBS Foods USA, we’re leading the way to sustainability in the agriculture industry, committing to achieve net-zero by 2040 and reducing water usage, gas usage, and greenhouse emissions across the board.
Learn more about the steps we’re taking to create a sustainable future. Learn more. | | |
| | | The Ford Foundation said it won't invest in fossil-fuel-related industries going forward. Currently, just 0.3 percent of the $16 billion endowment is directly invested in fossil fuel companies. The McKnight Foundation set a net-zero emissions goal across its $3 billion endowment by 2050, making it the largest U.S. private foundation to make such a pledge. Fifteen percent of its endowment currently is invested in assets that mitigate emissions. Amazon, IKEA, Michelin, Unilever and other large companies said they’ll convert their ocean freight vessels to zero-carbon fuels by 2040. The idea is to harness the buying power of the world’s largest cargo owners to accelerate decarbonization of marine shipping. Toyota Motor Corp. and Stellantis (formerly Fiat Chrysler) on Monday each announced plans to build battery manufacturing plants in the U.S. Toyota aims to invest $3.4 billion through 2030. Stellantis is partnering with South Korea’s LG conglomerate but didn’t disclose the size of its investment. The Wall Street Journal has more. Gap Inc. hired PJ Newcomb as head of environmental sustainability. Newcomb previously spent nine years at The Coca Cola Co.
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Rodrigo Abd/AP Photo | — Cow manure is worth more than milk, thanks to California’s pay-to-pollute laws. Farmers are selling their methane, The Fresno Bee reports. — Days could be numbered for forever chemicals. The EPA has launched a three-year plan to regulate PFAS. NBC digs into the issue. — What do you know about your neighbors? The nonprofit Environmental Defense Fund has an interactive map of 81,000 documented orphan oil and gas wells, which can leak toxic chemicals, including methane.
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