Running for Office on Climate Change?

May 14, 2020

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by Peter Brown (Euro Marketing Tools/Biofuels Digest) This election cycle has confirmed that the United States’ political hopefuls have abdicated any participation, influence and presence in the climate change debate as it is being set out in the various ecosystems around the world. This is happening in the face of every candidate running for any office in 2020 having declared themselves as climate change candidates and that is a real problem for the parties and individuals moving forward. State elected offices through Presidential politics, all have a grin and a nod at “climate change”.

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What is fascinating is that neither party has actually decided to confront climate change in a real and significant manner. What happened is that they have agreed to keep that topic out of the debates, the rhetoric and any significant proposals. Ignoring any technological advances, that would have allowed one of the other candidate to achieve hero status for very little effort by endorsing local energy projects or technologies that would benefit broad spectrums of their bases, the candidates are forging ahead on a rigid “business as usual” mainstream message.

To start with the posturing is not only universal but the messages are identical, culminating in the Democrat’s Green New Deal which does not contain any new or useful programs or ideas. It has all been said before with less hype and more thought with a notable exception in that the GND actually takes us away from the real pioneers in climate change and poses a significant threat to actually implementing the changes in time to avert what every climatologist, ecologist and politician on the forefront of this slow moving disaster are telling us. By promoting and expressing concern, the universal thoughts and prayers, they are ensuring inactivity at the national level and allowing the less informed to push their own weak spot remedies like PV panels and electric cars as band aids for gigantic shifts in energy options. Incumbents in office pass significant legislation and create mythical realities that will be subject to overturns since some reach all the way to 2050 for implementation.

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Wonderful, there is not one word towards meeting those lofty goals with a simple attempt at a concrete proposal.

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There are 265 million cars in America of which one million are electric. Do you see where the disconnect between eliminating the internal combustion engine in favor of the battery powered device could be a problem? So when you stand in front of your constituents and potential voters, enunciate a real program. Do not hesitate to fly in the face of the easy and popular, although dance carefully along the lines of the real solution to transportation lies in electrifying a much larger portion of the miles we all have to travel. All personal cars cannot be battery powered so you suggest moving into the hydrogen economy with fuels cells that recharge with methane gas. And away you go!

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Over time, the windmills in Holland now power the rail system of that highly compact and urban little country.

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Specifically in the Pacific Northwest, where Jay Inslee, governor of Washington ran for president, a set of circumstances that is not unique, but propitious, has presented any politician running for any national, state or even local office with a wonderful program that is being ignored. By rolling our natural aversion to fracked gas and it’s connection to fossil fuels, into the need for clean energy, recent actions against dairy farms for polluting through manure overspreading, the need to support our farming communities, the presence of decentralized and independent from large corporations of untold amounts of biogas for other projects like DME and methanol replacement for fossil fuel diesel a situation has presented itself that could change the climate change debate.

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What is lacking is a sustained search for small steps away from knee jerk and new ways to bring the attention of your voters to the smaller steps required to make serious contributions to your campaign’s image.

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Since the technology is available, the barriers to entry are low; the criteria are not the viability or profitability of your project but its marketability and again the marketability of the image to the voters and beyond that to your supporters. This is key; you are spreading a message to a much wider audience than just your district, county or state.

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The sterile argument of yes we must do something about climate change, health care, education absolutely misses that crucial and most interesting step which is exposing of the new technology, the opportunities for vast new areas of study as these opportunities start ending up in the personnel ads, the intriguing new courses in high schools and college.

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But to get there you, as a leader will have to show the way and by showing the way you will allow several key and viral issues to be addressed. Climate change affects all of us, and it must be addressed by all in a uniform manner. Regardless of the position you are vying for there is an opening to introduce the topic in your campaign.

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Many political careers have been started early on. Donna Sinclair a college history professor at Washington State University now running for State Legislator in the 18^th. District, came to the table via a school board election win from Washougal, WA. She is one candidate who has examined the implications that replacing fossil fuel diesel with biodiesel dramatically cuts the particulate and poison emanating from the school buses, without having to make any changes to the infrastructure required by going electric. “I don’t think that ideas around jobs, the economy and a clean environment are mutually exclusive: Climate change affects kids in the schoolyard and ideas to mitigate the damage can be taken all the way to the White House because it is one urgently needed topic that requires more than knee jerk reactions. It requires the full support of all branches where elections populate the ranks, regardless of location or technology.”

From the schoolyard to the white house, by way of state level initiatives. One of the key concepts that Europe promoted was any activity that eliminated the use of fossil fuels had to be encouraged, sometimes one gallon at a time. If that activity created a revenue stream so much the better. That is how mandatory biofuels were injected into the market and it is understood that each gallon of diesel fuel will contain up to 8% clean burning biodiesel, and that is 8% less fossil fuels pumped into the atmosphere.

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In other words, and this the important message of this article, prepare a business plan for any voter to follow, the assure them that you will do your utmost, with the determination and dedication of your future office to pave the way for that climate changing blueprint to become reality.

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Maybe you want to help the farmers of your district, then you immerse yourself in Biodigester minutiae, and the complex dance between legislation and incentives. Let the spirit of RINs guide you to extract all that is available from carbon credits. Make no mistake, handling this type of campaign means that you must educate your voters in the absolute benefits of what you are using as your platform and at one point you will have built a complex but knowledgeable corps of people and companies who will not only get you elected but you will have made it imperative for them to want and need you on the team within your county, district, state or country.

Win-win means to win the election so that all win in the end, especially the environment, that much endorsed, sadly neglected vitally important elephant on the table in the upcoming Donnybrook of which all are experts and very few embrace with intelligence, feelings and commitment. READ MORE

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is working with the Biden campaign on climate policy. (Washington Post)

Excerpt from Washington Post: The liberal congresswoman from New York is “serving on a climate policy panel that the former vice president created as part of a larger effort to woo the party’s left wing," Annie Linskey reports. She will act as a representative for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who she supported in the race for the Democratic nomination. READ MORE