Writing in Vox, Brad Plumer argues that saving the planet will require destroying the U.S. economy. From, “The Math on Staying Below 2 Degrees Global Warming Looks Increasingly Brutal:”
In the United States, the necessary cuts would require policies exponentially more ambitious than anything the Obama administration has been doing through the Environmental Protection Agency. Under an “equity” approach we’d need to go zero carbon by 2040 — just 25 years!
Congress would obviously need to get involved, either by enacting carbon pricing or other policies to massively scale up zero-carbon energy. This would entail World War II–style mobilization.
“Brutal” doesn’t describe it. We are talking economic destruction:
Climate scientist Kevin Anderson recently argued in Nature Geoscience that the only way we’ll stay below 2°C is if we either a) develop negative-emissions technology, or b) opt for negative economic growth. The math is too brutal otherwise.
Please run on that plank, Democrats! Let the people decide if we want to live in a permanent Great Depression.