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Combat Climate Change, Build a Clean Energy Economy, and Secure Environmental Justice
Climate change is an urgent threat and a defining challenge of our time. Fifteen of the 16 hottest
years on record have occurred this century. While Donald Trump has called climate change a
“hoax,” 2016 is on track to break global temperature records once more. Cities from Miami to
Baltimore are already threatened by rising seas. California and the West have suffered years of
brutal drought. Alaska has been scorched by wildfire. New York has been battered by
superstorms, and Texas swamped by flash floods. The best science tells us that without
ambitious, immediate action across our economy to cut carbon pollution and other greenhouse
gases, all of these impacts will be far worse in the future. We cannot leave our children a planet
that has been profoundly damaged.
Democrats share a deep commitment to tackling the climate challenge; creating millions of
good-paying middle class jobs; reducing greenhouse gas emissions more than 80 percent below
2005 levels by 2050; and meeting the pledge President Obama put forward in the landmark Paris
Agreement, which aims to keep global temperature increases to “well below” two degrees
Celsius and to pursue efforts to limit global temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius. We
believe America must be running entirely on clean energy by mid-century. We will take bold
steps to slash carbon pollution and protect clean air at home, lead the fight against climate
change around the world, ensure no Americans are left out or left behind as we accelerate the
transition to a clean energy economy, and be responsible stewards of our natural resources and
our public lands and waters. Democrats reject the notion that we have to choose between
protecting our planet and creating good-paying jobs. We can and we will do both.
Building a Clean Energy Economy
We are committed to getting 50 percent of our electricity from clean energy sources within a
decade, with half a billion solar panels installed within four years and enough renewable energy
to power every home in the country. We will cut energy waste in American homes, schools,
hospitals, and offices through energy efficient improvements; modernize our electric grid; and
make American manufacturing the cleanest and most efficient in the world. These efforts will
create millions of new jobs and save families and businesses money on their monthly energy
bills. We will transform American transportation by reducing oil consumption through cleaner
fuels, vehicle electrification increasing the fuel efficiency of cars, boilers, ships, and trucks. We
will make new investments in public transportation and build bicycle and pedestrian
infrastructure across our urban and suburban areas. Democrats believe the tax code must reflect
our commitment to a clean energy future by eliminating special tax breaks and subsidies for
fossil fuel companies as well as defending and extending tax incentives for energy efficiency and
clean energy.
Democrats believe that carbon dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gases should be priced to
reflect their negative externalities, and to accelerate the transition to a clean energy economy and
help meet our climate goals. Democrats believe that climate change is too important to wait for
climate deniers and defeatists in Congress to start listening to science, and support using every
tool available to reduce emissions now. Democrats are committed to defending, implementing,
and extending smart pollution and efficiency standards, including the Clean Power Plan, fuel economy standards for automobiles and heavy-duty vehicles, building codes and appliance
standards. We are also committed to expanding clean energy research and development.
Democrats recognize the importance of climate leadership at the local level and know that
achieving our national clean energy goals requires an active partnership with states, cities, and
rural communities where so much of our country’s energy policy is made. We will ensure that
those taking the lead on clean energy and energy efficiency have the tools and resources they
need to succeed. The federal government should lead by example, which is why we support
taking steps to power the government with 100 percent clean electricity.
Democrats are committed to closing the Halliburton loophole that stripped the Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) of its ability to regulate hydraulic fracturing, and ensuring tough
safeguards are in place, including Safe Drinking Water Act provisions, to protect local water
supplies. We believe hydraulic fracturing should not take place where states and local
communities oppose it. We will reduce methane emissions from all oil and gas production and
transportation by at least 40 to 45 percent below 2005 levels by 2025 through common-sense
standards for both new and existing sources and by repairing and replacing thousands of miles of
leaky pipes. This will both protect our climate and create thousands of good-paying jobs.
We will work to expand access to cost-saving renewable energy by low-income households,
create good-paying jobs in communities that have struggled with energy poverty, and oppose
efforts by utilities to limit consumer choice or slow clean energy deployment. We will streamline
federal permitting to accelerate the construction of new transmission lines to get low-cost
renewable energy to market, and incentivize wind, solar, and other renewable energy over the
development of new natural gas power plants.
We support President Obama's decision to reject the Keystone XL pipeline. As we continue
working to reduce carbon dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gas emissions, we must ensure
federal actions do not “significantly exacerbate” global warming. We support a comprehensive
approach that ensures all federal decisions going forward contribute to solving, not significantly
exacerbating, climate change.
Democrats believe that our commitment to meeting the climate challenge must also be reflected
in the infrastructure investments we make. We need to make our existing infrastructure safer and
cleaner and build the new infrastructure necessary to power our clean energy future. To create
good-paying middle class jobs that cannot be outsourced, Democrats support high labor
standards in clean energy infrastructure and the right to form or join a union, whether in
renewable power or advanced vehicle manufacturing. During the clean energy transition, we will
ensure landowners, communities of color, and tribal nations are at the table.
Securing Environmental and Climate Justice
Democrats believe clean air and clean water are basic rights of all Americans. Yet as we saw in
Flint, Michigan, low-income communities and communities of color are disproportionately home
to environmental justice “hot spots,” where air pollution, water pollution, and toxic hazards like
lead increase health and economic hardship. The impacts of climate change will also
disproportionately affect low-income and minority communities, tribal nations, and Alaska Native villages—all of which suffer the worst losses during extreme weather and have the fewest
resources to prepare. Simply put, this is environmental racism.
Democrats believe we must make it a national priority to eradicate lead poisoning, which
disproportionately impacts low-income children and children of color and can lead to lifelong
health and educational challenges. We will prioritize hiring and training workers from affected
communities to clean up toxic brownfields and expand clean energy, energy efficiency, and
resilient infrastructure.
The fight against climate change must not leave any community out or behind—including the
coal communities who kept America’s lights on for generations. Democrats will fight to make
sure these workers and their families get the benefits they have earned and the respect they
deserve, and we will make new investments in energy-producing communities to help create jobs
and build a brighter and more resilient economic future. We will also oppose threats to the public
health of these communities from harmful and dangerous extraction practices, like mountaintop
removal mining operations.
All corporations owe it to their shareholders to fully analyze and disclose the risks they face,
including climate risk. Those who fail to do so should be held accountable. Democrats also
respectfully request the Department of Justice to investigate allegations of corporate fraud on the
part of fossil fuel companies accused of misleading shareholders and the public on the scientific
reality of climate change.[6]
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Kaine on climate change
