Climate Change Policy Positions

Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions

We must establish mandates to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 62 percent by 2030.

Like all other nations, the U.S. must do its fair share to equitably address the global crisis of climate change, taking into account its responsibility for causing climate change and its capacity to act. In order to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 C above pre-industrial levels with a low chance of overshoot, the United States’ fair share of the total global mitigation effort is — at a minimum — 28 percent, equivalent to a national greenhouse gas reduction target of about 62 percent by 2030. The EPA must
maintain its authority to regulate greenhouse gas, or GHG, and federal mandates and public investment programs need to be instituted to meet this target and drive GHG reductions across the economy.

In particular, Friends of the Earth Action believes:

• Federal GHG reduction mandates must refer to absolute reductions. “Net” emissions reductions are not good enough. For example, regenerative agricultural practices can sequester carbon, but they should be done in addition to, and not instead of, carbon reductions in the energy sector.
• Reduction strategies must eschew false solutions such as carbon trading and carbon offsets, which have been proven to exacerbate pollution hotspots.
• Reduction targets must not be met via expensive, unproven technologies that extend fossil fuel use, such as carbon capture and storage.
• Reduction targets must not be achieved via controversial and risky climate geoengineering techniques, including solar radiation management, greenhouse gas removal and sequestration and weather modification, which could have devastating impacts.
• Major fossil fuel companies should be held legally liable and accountable for climate damages.

Transition to 100% Renewable Energy

We must make a rapid and just transition to 100 percent renewable, resilient and just energy and food systems.

In the energy sector, this means adopting policies, programs and incentives to:

• Rapidly phase out all extraction and burning of fossil fuels, starting with a ban on new fossil fuel leasing in federal lands and waters and a moratorium on federal permits for fossil fuel projects that have the greatest impact on frontline communities and sensitive ecosystems.
• Pursue a managed decline of existing fossil fuel projects and nuclear power plants.
• Aggressively phase up energy efficiency programs, including adopting mandates and investments to achieve 100 percent renewable energy by 2035, which will require investing in energy storage and updating our electrical grid.
• Phase out “green” energy sources that create environmental harm, such as biofuels, nuclear power and biomass and waste-to-energy (e.g., from concentrated animal feeding operations or waste incinerators) projects. This includes ending the federal corn ethanol/ biofuels mandate.

In the agriculture sector, this means adopting policies, programs and incentives to:

• Cap GHG emissions from the agriculture sector.
• Transition away from industrial animal agriculture (concentrated animal feeding operations) and chemical- and energy-intensive monocultures.
• Aggressively support diversified, organic and regenerative agricultural practices that rely on low/natural carbon inputs and that store carbon in healthy soil.
• Promote organic and ecological small- and mid-scale food production systems to help local economies and create higher numbers of dignified jobs than energy-intensive large-scale commodity agriculture.
• Shift public food purchasing and feeding programs (e.g., school lunch) away from carbonintensive animal foods toward healthier, climate-friendly plant-based alternatives.

In the transportation sector, this means adopting policies, programs and incentives to:

• Curb sprawling urban development, including through investments in highways, roads, etc.
• Invest in infrastructure that connects our cities and suburbs in ways that reduce vehicle and air traffic.
• Invest in an extensive national network of public transport, including a national rapid train system, and in public transit systems that are fully powered by renewables and are accessible to those who need them most.
• Support the build-out of charging stations and the affordability of electric vehicles.
• Clean up and reduce the carbon footprint of the shipping industry.

Just Transition

We must ensure that a Just Transition advances social, racial and economic justice.

Climate policies and programs should ensure that workers and communities, especially those from and impacted by the fossil fuel sector, are made whole through strategies to compensate for losses, and to support them in adapting and thriving in a new economy. Friends of the Earth Action supports:

• A federal green jobs guarantee that pays a family-sustaining wage and ensures dignified and safe work.
• Federal policy approaches that support communities, cities and states in leading the creation and implementation of Just Transition, climate adaptation and climate resilience plans.
• Planning processes that are transparent, participatory and involve affected communities, especially ensuring the participation of minority and low-income communities and those hit first and worst by climate impacts.
• Just Transition strategies that promote local solutions that make good on the promise of public ownership and cooperative control.
• Just Transition strategies that uphold and expand human rights, including labor rights such as the right to organize and collectively bargain. In particular, climate initiatives must uphold indigenous peoples’ treaty rights and their right (under the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples) to Free, Prior and Informed Consent for legislation or developments that impact tribal lands, resources or heritage.
• Climate policies that protect rights to water, food, land and energy for all, including energy sufficiency: renewable energy access at a level that respects everyone’s right to a dignified life.

Public Investments

We must make massive public investments and realign programs, financing and incentives.

We need a Green New Deal that would rival the scope and impact of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s public investment plan. Without aggressive public investment, it will be impossible to reach the carbon reductions needed, let alone make the transition described above in a just and equitable manner.

Friends of the Earth Action supports:

• Rolling back tax cuts (e.g., the 2018 Trump tax cuts, which will cost $2.3 trillion over 10 years), raising new revenue (e.g., closing offshore tax havens, which could raise $129 billion to $205 billion per year) and scaling back on some current budget expenditures (e.g., cutting military spending by $350 billion) to pay for a Green New Deal.
• Realigning existing federal programs and institutions to foster this transition. For example, federal institutions such as the Tennessee Valley Authority should wind down nuclear and fossil fuels while scaling up renewable energy.
• Redirecting spending programs, such as the Farm Bill ($1 trillion between 2019-2030) and the national school lunch program to support a transition to organic, regenerative agriculture.
• Eliminating subsidies and incentives for fossil fuels (over $100 billion over 10 years), including international subsidies such as Export-Import Bank financing, and redirecting them to renewable energy.

Uphold U.S. International Climate Obligations

The U.S. must rejoin the global community and constructively engage in good faith in the Paris Agreement and its implementation.

We must do our fair share by not only making our own domestic mitigation commitments, but also providing climate finance. Under the next president, the U.S. must:

• Provide developing countries with finance to adapt to and mitigate climate change and provide funds for loss and damage in quantities and via mechanisms commensurate with what science and justice demand. As a start, the U.S. should fulfill the $2 billion balance of the U.S.’ overdue pledge to the Green Climate Fund and provide an additional $6 billion as part of the Fund’s first replenishment process.
• In addition, the U.S. must also enable and facilitate the transfer to developing countries of environmentally sound, socially just technologies that are appropriate, affordable and easily accessible.