Name: Analysis | The Energy 202: Democrats seek to spotlight climate change at convention despite coronavirus crisis
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Analysis | The Energy 202: Democrats seek to spotlight climate change at convention despite coronavirus crisis

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This article was published more than&nbsp;2 years agoCommentGift ShareDemocrats will try to bring climate change to the fore during the party's unconventional convention starting this week.&nbsp;But it remains to be seen how much the issue of rising temperatures will break through when the country is in the throes of the coronavirus pandemic.&nbsp;The week-long event once planned for Milwaukee’s Wisconsin Center has gone mostly virtual. The Democratic National Committee is trying to re-create the feel of a lively in-person nomination party for Joe Biden and Sen. Kamala D. Harris (D-Calif.), with hundreds of live feeds for delegates and other Democrats following from home.Some DNC members are planning events emphasizing what they see as another existential crisis.On Monday, the party’s youth council will meet with activists focused on the disproportionate impact pollution has on poor and minority communities.Advertisement“Young people know that climate change is an urgent priority for our planet,” said Michael Kapp, chair of the DNC Youth Council.And on Tuesday, another committee, the DNC Council on the Environment and Climate Crisis, will host a two-hour virtual event with panels on Biden’s climate plan and why Democrats should run on climate change.Speakers at that event include Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D), who cast climate change as the central issue of our time during his own presidential run; environmentalist and financier Tom Steyer, who also ran for president; and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison.The party is also planning to host on investing in clean energy, building environmentally sustainable infrastructure and tackling climate climate.It is unclear how many people will tune in to an online convention.Allison Stephens, director of Black engagement for the climate council and a DNC delegate from Nevada, said she thinks younger voters are used to watching online events. The DNC said 3,400 people have registered to attend the climate council's two panels so far.Advertisement“I don’t have concerns at all about the virtual environment,” Stephens said. “Maybe that’s because I’m a millennial.”Then there’s the coronavirus pandemic — an emergency that has eclipsed all other issues. Thirty-three percent of registered voters in a nationwide Kaiser Family Foundation poll in May that climate change was a “very important” issue&nbsp;— 10 percentage points lower than another KFF survey in February.&nbsp;But Michelle Regalado Deatrick, chair of the climate council, said the coronavirus is inextricably linked to environmental degradation, noting that preliminary studies show air pollution is making the respiratory disease caused by the virus more lethal.&nbsp;“The pandemic puts a greater emphasis on climate change and environmental justice,” said Deatrick.&nbsp;The DNC is tight-lipped about how else climate change will be featured on the convention's main stage. &nbsp;“We haven't announced all of our programming for the week, but the urgent global crisis posed by climate change is definitely a focus,” a DNC spokesman told The Energy 202.AdvertisementAs my colleague Michael Scherer , the broadcast networks have promised to air one hour of the convention per night.Several Democratic heavyweights who have made climate change a political priority, such as former secretary of state John F. Kerry, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), will have prime-time speaking slots.But other Democrats who like to talk a lot about global warming, such as Inslee and former vice president Al Gore, aren't scheduled to get that airtime.The White House over the weekend pulled William Pendley’s nomination to head the Bureau of Land Management.&nbsp;The Trump administration on Saturday withdrew the controversial nomination amid signs that the choice could hurt the reelection chances of two Senate Republicans, Cory Gardner (Colo.) and Steve Daines (Mont.).“The nomination was controversial because Pendley, who was previously president of the right-wing Mountain States Legal Foundation, had once urged the sale of federal lands,” my colleague Steven Mufson . “And at the foundation, he had sued the Interior Department on behalf of an oil and gas prospector, sought to undermine protections of endangered species such as the grizzly bear, and pressed to radically reduce the size of federal lands to make way for development.”&nbsp;AdvertisementIt was unclear how Gardner and Daines, both in tight reelection races, would vote on Pendley, but all 47 members of the Senate Democratic Caucus already have that they oppose his bid to become director.Pendley is the bureau’s deputy director for policy and programs and has been its acting director since July 2019.The Trump administration scraps Obama-era limits on methane leaks at oil and gas sites.The new rules issued late last week by the Office of Management and Budget effectively takes back the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to regulate methane and lets oil and gas companies to decide how much of the potent greenhouse gas can escape into the atmosphere from wells, pipelines and storage tanks, Mufson .In remarks in Pittsburgh, in a battleground state in the 2020 race, EPA chief Andrew Wheeler called the move another part of “President Trump’s promise to cut burdensome and ineffective regulations for our domestic energy industry.”AdvertisementBut green groups and even a handful of the biggest oil and gas companies supported keeping the Obama-rules because, as Mufson writes, “they meant the companies could capture — and sell — methane that would otherwise escape into the atmosphere."Death Valley hit a blistering 130 degrees Fahrenheit on Sunday.&nbsp;The Los Angeles Times the mark “possibly the highest mercury reading on Earth since 1913.“If the National Weather Service’s recording is correct,” the newspaper adds, “it would also be among the top-three highest temperatures to have ever been measured in Death Valley, as well as the highest temperature ever seen there during the month of August.”The national park in eastern California is the lowest and driest place in the United States, and holds the record for the hottest temperature ever recorded on Earth — 134 degrees recorded on a July afternoon in 1913.Per the climate data in xmACIS2, this is the first time since 1913 that Death Valley has reached 130F. In July 2013, it last reached 129F. If valid, it would be the hottest August temperature at the site by 3F. — NWS WPC (@NWSWPC)CommentsGift ArticleTOP STORIESThe BriefingDon’t miss reporting and analysis from the Hill and the White House.Try a different topic or to save your preferences

This article was published more than&nbsp;2 years agoCommentGift ShareDemocrats will try to bring climate change to the fore during the party's unconventional convention starting this week.&nbsp;But it remains to be seen how much the issue of rising temperatures will break through when the country is in the throes of the coronavirus pandemic.&nbsp;The week-long event once planned for Milwaukee’s Wisconsin Center has gone mostly virtual. The Democratic National Committee is trying to re-create the feel of a lively in-person nomination party for Joe Biden and Sen. Kamala D. Harris (D-Calif.),...

Analysis | The Energy 202: Democrats seek to spotlight climate change at convention despite coronavirus crisis

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