Down to Earth is a monthly environmental column that explores what it means to live sustainably. Credit: Meghan Beery | Senior Lantern Reporter

Down to Earth is a monthly environmental column that explores what it means to live sustainably. Credit: Meghan Beery | Senior Lantern Reporter

Down to Earth is a monthly environmental column that explores what it means to live sustainably.

Tuesday, millions of Americans will head to the polls and vote in the 2024 election, casting ballots for presidential and vice-presidential candidates, senators and representatives of all kinds. 

One of the items implicitly wrapped in this election — among many others — is the future of climate change policies in the United States and beyond.

The Republican and Democratic presidential candidates, former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, respectively, differ drastically in their views and potential policies regarding climate change. Ramiro Berardo, an Ohio State professor in environmental and natural resources policy, said this is typical of the increasingly partisan attitudes surrounding environmental topics.

“The history of environmental policy in the U.S. in the last four years has been one of constant tension,” Berardo said. “In the ‘70s, we had a time of bipartisanship in Congress regarding environmental laws. But since then, the Republicans and the Democrats have taken divergent paths about what we need to do to protect the environment.”

Climate change itself is a distinct problem, as it requires thinking about politics in a new way, said Benjamin McKean, an Ohio State professor of political science and a political theorist.

“There aren’t really a lot of problems like it in the sense that it really is something that requires global action to address and will affect everybody; [it] is already affecting many people and will surely affect everybody in the long run,” McKean said. “So, I think it scrambles a lot of our ideas about what democracy is.”

Harris

According to her campaign website, Harris plans to advance environmental justice, protect public land, increase resilience to climate disasters, lower energy costs, create jobs and hold “polluters” accountable. Specific policy details, however, are not currently laid out online.

Harris’ vice-presidential record regarding environmental issues consists of two major pieces of legislation, Berardo said.

“The Inflation Reduction Act that was passed in 2022 and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill that was also signed into law in 2021 — these two big, very big pieces of legislation basically pour a lot of money into transforming the way we produce energy and the way we consume energy,” Berardo said.

In many ways, President Joe Biden’s administration was transformative when it came to addressing climate issues, Berardo said.

“Biden came in and he rejoined the Paris Agreement, and he sort of upped the ante because he came up with even stronger goals than President [Barack] Obama had leading to the Paris Agreement,” Berardo said. “And so, now the U.S. has promised to reduce emissions by 50 to 52% by 2030.”

According to the United Nations, the Paris Agreement is a legally binding international climate change treaty adopted in November 2016. To limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, the 196 parties involved must routinely communicate about how they plan to reduce their emissions.

Even so, McKean said the treaty doesn’t do enough.

“Even the Paris Agreement doesn’t get us where we need to be, and of course, the Paris Agreement isn’t even binding, so it sets emissions targets, but there’s not really meaningful penalties if you don’t meet them,” McKean said. “And of course, a big part of why it has that structure is because a binding treaty would require approval from the U.S. Senate.”

Though the Harris administration would be unlikely to leave the Paris Agreement, as Trump did in 2020, that doesn’t mean it will live up to the standards outlined in the treaty, McKean said.

“I think it’s very significant that a Trump administration would not even live up to these very modest commitments,” McKean said. “But, I think it’s not at all obvious that a Harris administration would do enough either.”

Trump

Berardo said he expects the Trump administration will withdraw from the Paris Agreement for a second time.

“I expect him to do what he did already, which is just withdraw,” Berardo said. “If you don’t think that climate change is real, then why should you be spending money on it? I think that’s what we can expect. There might be some political pushback, even from members of his own party that see the economic benefits of transitioning to greener sources of energy.”

Trump’s campaign website states one of his “20 Core Promises” is to “Make America the dominant energy producer in the world, by far!” According to the Trump Republican Platform, this includes producing more oil and gas, as well as making energy more affordable.

“Republicans will unleash Energy Production from all sources, including nuclear, to immediately slash Inflation and power American homes, cars, and factories with reliable, abundant, and affordable Energy,” the platform states.

Additionally, Berardo said Trump could repeal portions of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act that incentivize electric car use.

“One of the things that the Inflation Reduction Act does is it gives a lot of money in incentives to have more electric cars on the streets, to build a network of charging power stations for electric cars across the nation,” Berardo said. “And Trump has been incredibly critical of all of that, calling it a waste of money, basically [saying], ‘They’ve only built a handful of charging stations and they cost so much, it’s just a waste of money.’” 

There are estimates the Inflation Reduction Act will become as expensive as $1.2 trillion, Berardo said.

Local initiatives

When it comes to climate policies, local initiatives — not just presidential elections — matter, McKean said. One of the issues on the ballot for Central Ohioans is a sales tax levy for COTA. 

“Whether or not there will be more spending on public transportation here in Columbus, obviously that’s not gotten the same attention as the presidential election for very good reasons, but those are exactly the kinds of local initiatives that need to be happening everywhere and need to be happening much, much more,” McKean said.

The process of addressing climate issues ultimately runs deeper than voting in elections, McKean said.

“There’s certainly a sense in which climate is on the ballot, but it’s also clear that we’re not going to solve this issue just by voting in a presidential election,” McKean said. “We need to be doing a lot more.”