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WASHINGTON – Less food. More traffic accidents. Extreme weather is hitting nuclear landfills. Immigrants flock to the United States, fleeing an even worse disaster in their home country.
These scenarios, once dystopian fiction, now drive American policymaking. Under President Biden’s orders, senior officials in every government agency have spent months thinking about the biggest climate threats their institutions are facing and how to deal with them.
On Thursday, the White House presented the first look at the results and published the results. Climate adaptation plans of 23 agenciesIncluding the Energy, Defense, Agriculture, Homeland Security, Transportation and Commerce departments. The plans reveal the dangers a warming planet poses to every aspect of American life and the challenge of tackling these threats.
The federal government had tried this exercise before during the Obama administration. That work effectively stalled under former President Donald J. Trump, who caused most agencies that disdain climate science to either shelve their climate change plans or stop talking about it.
Within weeks of taking office, President Biden instructed the authorities to quickly resume work. Emphasizing the urgency of the threat, the president gave the agencies four months to draw up plans that listed their main vulnerabilities to climate change and strategies to address them.
“Nearly every service that government provides will be affected by climate change sooner or later,” said Jesse Keenan, a professor at Tulane University who focuses on climate adaptation and advises federal agencies.
The plans released on Thursday are short, most less than 30 pages. Key themes include: ensuring new facilities meet more stringent construction standards, using less energy and water in existing buildings, better protecting workers against extreme heat, educating staff in climate science, and creating supply chains that are less likely to be disrupted by storms or storms. other shocks.
The documents also reflect Mr. Biden’s emphasis on racial equality by looking at the effects of climate change on minority and low-income communities and how institutions can address them. For example, the Department of Health and Human Services said research grants will focus on health impacts on these communities.
But the most revealing information in the newly released plans may be the sometimes outspoken descriptions of the dangers of climate change.
Agriculture
The Department of Agriculture lists how climate change threatens America’s food supply: Changes in temperature and precipitation patterns, more pests and diseases, reduced soil quality, fewer pollinating insects, and more storms and wildfires will combine to reduce crops and animals.
To meet these challenges, the ministry calls for more research on climate threats and better communication of these findings to farmers.
The plan is also sincere about the limits of what can be done. For example, in response to drought, farmers can install new irrigation systems and governments can build new dams. However, the ministry notes that irrigation is expensive and that the dams affect the ecosystems around them.
Public transport
Climate change also threatens Americans’ ability to move within and between cities, restricting not just mobility but the transport of goods that drive the economy. In its list of possible effects of climate change, the Ministry of Transport states that rising temperatures will make it more expensive to build and maintain roads and bridges.
And the experience of getting around will become slower and more frustrating. Congestion will increase as traffic slows, as hot days cause asphalt to deteriorate. Severe weather events “sometimes will require extended flight cancellations” and more heat will force airplanes to fly shorter distances and carry less weight.
Some of the effects that the transportation department expects are dangerous. These include “more frequent/severe flooding of underground tunnels” and “increased risk of vehicle accidents in severe weather”.
The ride quality could even get worse. The plan warns of “decreased driver/operator performance and decision-making skills due to driver fatigue as a result of bad weather.”
Energy
Sometimes plans show how much work remains. The Department of Energy, for example, said it has assessed climate risks for only half of its facilities, from advanced research laboratories to storage facilities for radioactive waste from the nuclear weapons program.
“The DOE’s nuclear safety mission is conducted at DOE sites that are critical to national security and are also largely vulnerable to extreme weather,” the department’s plan states. “The DoE’s environmental mission may face disruptions if facilities dedicated to radioactive waste processing and disposal are affected by climate hazards.”
The department says it can address this threat, but does not go into details. “DOE has a well-established hazard assessment and adaptation process focused on high-hazard nuclear facilities. This process ensures that the most critical facilities are well protected from climate risks,” the plan says.
National security
For the Department of Homeland Security, climate change means the risk of large numbers of climate refugees – people reaching the US border, pushed out of their country by long-term challenges like a drought or sudden shocks like a tsunami.
“Climate change is likely to increase population movements in Mexico, Central America, South America and the Caribbean,” says the episode’s plan. The department is working to develop a “responsive and coordinated operational plan for mass migration events.”
The plan comes just weeks after President Biden prisoner Border Patrol officers on horseback for their treatment of Haitian immigrants crossing the border into Texas. The administration later faced criticism for sending many of these immigrants. back to Haiti, still grappling with environmental challenges of the kind described in the plan.
Beyond saying it will “focus on national security and balanced, fair outcomes,” the department doesn’t say how it plans to respond in the future as more people flee to the United States.
Defense
The Department of Defense wrote in its climate plan that climate change will lead to new sources of conflict and complicate the work of the military.
Water shortages could even be a new source of tension between the US military overseas and the countries where troops are deployed. In DOD regions outside the US, “military water requirements can compete with local water needs, creating potential areas of friction and even conflict.”
But the plan says learning to work in extreme weather conditions should be viewed as a new type of weapon, one that could help the United States defeat enemies. “This allows U.S. forces to gain distinct advantages over potential adversaries,” the plan says, “if our forces can operate in conditions where others need to take refuge or land.”
trade
Not all climate threats facing the federal government are insurmountable.
The Department of Commerce, which runs the U.S. Patent and Trade Office, said it expects an increase in patent applications for “technology related to climate change adaptation” as the effects of climate change become more severe. Such an increase “will affect the department’s ability to process such applications in a timely manner and have a direct impact on the competitiveness and economic growth of the United States.”
At least there is a solution to this challenge. For inventions that promise to help with environmental challenges, the department said, patent applications may line up or, as the plan states, “advance out of order for review once a petition is filed.”
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