Scientists say $2 trillion investment can decarbonize energy by 2050, paid for with a carbon tax
In the primaries, Joe Biden wasn’t the first choice of most climate hawks. For, example, the youth-led Sunrise Movement, which supports radical climate proposals, graded the top three candidates, putting Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren in first and second place, Biden coming in third with a score less than half that of the two senators. But after Sanders ended his campaign in April and endorsed Biden, the two set up a unity task force that came up with far more ambitious climate-related plans. Consequently, although Sunrise never formally endorsed Biden, it encouraged its 10,000 members and other supporters to work on getting him elected. Said co-founder and executive director Varshini Prakash in July, “We’ve seen a pretty huge transformation in Biden’s climate plan. What I’ve seen in the last six to eight weeks is a pretty big transition in upping his ambition and centering environmental justice.” Still not as far as Sunrise and other climate hawks would prefer, but a good first step, she said, one that responded in a good way to past criticisms.
One change was Biden’s commitment to a public investment of $2 trillion over four years—up from his primary campaign’s pledge of $1.7 trillion over 10 years—to accelerate the transformation to a clean energy economy. This would generate millions of union jobs to build renewable energy infrastructure, get zero-emission cars and mass transit systems on the road, boost sustainable home construction, improve conservation, and perform a multitude of other tasks that decarbonizing the economy by 2050—as the president has pledged—will require.
empowerment & inner transformation... 