Susan Walsh/AP Photo
President Joe Biden speaks at the Lucy Evans Baylands Nature Interpretive Center and Preserve in Palo Alto, California, June 19, 2023.
The Biden-Harris administration has made progress on 85 percent of climate change policies proposed by Evergreen Action in 2020, the climate nonprofit says in a report released today.
The group released their findings at a critical time for President Biden as he seeks to hold onto his candidacy and emphasize the accomplishments of the past four years. According to the study, the Biden-Harris administration has completed 155 proposals and made some progress on 125 out of the 329 policies proposed by Evergreen Action in their 2020 plan. That’s nearly half of the group’s proposals that have been completely accomplished.
Evergreen, founded by former staffers on Washington Gov. Jay Inslee’s 2020 presidential campaign, has been an influential player in the crafting of the White House’s environmental policies. Four years ago, the nonprofit adapted Inslee’s climate action plan into the Evergreen Action Plan, which put forth 329 climate and environmental recommendations for whoever would win the Democratic primary.
In July 2020, as the Democratic nominee, Biden put out his climate plan, which Evergreen notes contained key recommendations lifted from their plan. Some of the most monumental proposals in Biden’s plan were the creation of a Civilian Climate Corps, a commitment to direct 40 percent of climate investments to disadvantaged communities, and historic investments in clean energy.
After Biden’s election, many of the Evergreen Action Plan’s recommendations were swept up in the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), including the creation of green banking programs that fund climate action and grant programs like the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund.
Evergreen cites the administration’s pause on new exports of liquefied natural gas (LNG), a form of natural gas that is cooled to a liquid for easier transportation. The U.S. is the world’s top exporter of LNG, and our exports are predicted to double by the end of the decade. The temporary pause will allow the White House to evaluate LNG’s impacts on American communities near export facilities and the global risk of methane emissions. On July 1, though, a judge struck down the pause on LNG exports, arguing that the pause cannot stand while a legal challenge posed by 16 Republican-led states plays out in federal court.
Meanwhile, green manufacturing construction is on the rise in the wake of the IRA’s robust tax incentives. The U.S. far outpaces peer economies like Japan, Germany, the U.K., and Australia in rates of overall manufacturing construction, says the Department of the Treasury.
The Civilian Climate Corps was ultimately dropped from the IRA, but in April the administration did launch a more modest climate-related workforce initiative through AmeriCorps. The initial deployment calls for 20,000 American Climate Corps members, a reduction from the initial ambitions.
The IRA was an administration-defining bill, but is far from the only climate-focused action taken by the Biden-Harris administration since 2020. Evergreen Action’s report emphasized the administration’s historic gains in environmental justice, with policies that seek to address the disproportionate effects of climate change on low-income communities of color. The administration launched its Justice40 Initiative in response to the Action Plan’s call that the government funnel 40 percent of its climate investments into disadvantaged communities.
Alongside Justice40, the president formed the White House Environmental Justice Advisory Council, and the Environmental Protection Agency created an Office of Environmental Justice. According to today’s report, the administration has completed 13 of the Action Plan’s environmental justice actions, and the remaining eight are already in the works.
Some of the report feels like Evergreen is grading on a bit of a curve. The group gives the administration “some progress” on achieving a full renewable-energy standard and a retirement of the entire coal fleet by 2030, even though it concedes that neither is in statute. Evergreen says that the enhanced grid planning and Environmental Protection Agency carbon standards can make progress toward 100 percent renewable energy, while the EPA’s Clean Power Plan “will reduce most coal pollution.”
Still, most of what Biden-Harris was able to do at the agency level has at least been attempted. What about the 15 percent of proposals that the administration hasn’t tackled yet? “The few ideas that are not underway largely need Congress to move forward, and if Americans elect climate champions in all three chambers this November, they can,” the report argues.
At the end of the report, Evergreen Action makes the stakes of 2024 explicit: “As we once again move toward a crucial election, America will face a choice between the president who has done more than any other on climate and a convicted felon soliciting billions from Big Oil to reverse our progress.”
