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SUAREZ ON CLIMATE: Miami Mayor Francis Suarez is considered a longshot in the 2024 Republican presidential race, but one thing that could set him apart is his views on climate change, which are markedly more hawkish, especially compared to the two other formidable contenders from the Sunshine State.
Suarez, a 45-year-old Cuban American and two-term mayor who officially launched his candidacy this morning, is the third Florida Republican to throw his hat into the ring, and is expected to elaborate more on his candidacy tonight during a speech at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California.
His competitors from Florida alone are formidable: They include the state’s governor, Ron DeSantis, and, of course, former President Donald Trump, whose Mar-a-Lago resort is just a stone’s throw up the coast. Suarez has locked horns with them both. He voted against both Trump and DeSantis in their respective elections—opting to vote for DeSantis’s Democratic contender, Andrew Gillum, in 2018 and against Trump in 2016 and 2020.
Although he lacks the name recognition or experience of others in the field, his record as mayor suggests he could lead the GOP to embrace climate change and extreme weather events in a way that many other Republicans in the field have not.
Under Suarez, Miami released a comprehensive Stormwater Master Plan that would allocate $3.8 billion in the coming decades to build seawalls and other infrastructure to storm-proof the South Florida city. (For context, that’s roughly quadruple the city’s annual budget.)
He is the only U.S. mayor to serve on the Global Commission on Adaptation, led by former UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, and has earned accolades for his efforts to install pump stations and build a seawall in Miami to protect against storm surge and flooding. This is especially critical in Florida, where the UN predicts sea levels will rise by an additional two feet in the next 30 years.
Climate change “is not theoretical for the city of Miami—it’s real,” he told CBS News’s Margaret Brennan last year.
Here’s how his record stacks up to his fellow Sunshine State contenders: Trump famously withdrew the U.S. from the Paris climate accord during his tenure. His administration also dismantled or rolled back more than 100 climate policies and regulations on clean air, wildlife, and toxic chemical regulations.
Trump has famously said that climate change is “mythical,” “nonexistent,” and “an expensive hoax” — rhetoric he has embraced again as he vies for the 2024 nomination.
But DeSantis has earned somewhat mixed support from environmental groups in Florida. He has styled himself as a “Teddy Roosevelt” conservationist as governor, championing Everglades restoration, directing Florida’s EPA to oppose offshore fracking and drilling, and publicly committing to stopping sea level rise and stopping beach erosion, which have won him accolades with certain groups in the state.
“He’s been an absolute champion on the Everglades, and for reducing harmful discharges to our coastal estuaries,” said Everglades Trust CEO Anna Upton, whose group endorsed DeSantis in both his gubernatorial races. But he refuses to use the term “climate change,” and has been described by one environmental group as an “ostrich putting its head in the sand.”
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…MEANWHILE, BIDEN WON ENDORSEMENTS FROM MAJOR CLIMATE GROUPS: Four major environmental groups endorsed President Joe Biden for reelection last night during a dinner hosted by the League of Conservation Voters, marking the first time the four groups have ever jointly thrown their weight behind a single candidate.
The groups, including the League of Conservation Voters Action Fund, the Sierra Club, the NextGen PAC, and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), praised Biden’s work on the environment and climate change, including his administration’s rejoining of the Paris climate accord, his goals to slash transportation emissions by 50% by 2030, and the successful passage of the Inflation Reduction Act.
The Biden administration “has done far more to address the climate crisis and environmental injustice than any administration in our nation’s history,” they said in a statement.
Biden also used the dinner to play up his environmental bona fides, including the IRA, which allocates $369 billion to climate and clean energy spending, as well as his administration’s efforts to help low-income communities and others vulnerable to the effects of climate change.
“We made a lot of progress but there’s so much more to do,” he said.
He also took aim at Republicans, whom he accused of trying to “repeal the climate provisions of the [IRA] and replace them with handouts to the fossil fuel industry.”
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) was also honored at the LCV event, where she was awarded a lifetime achievement award.
ICYMI – BIDEN VETOES TRUCK EMISSIONS RULE CRA: Biden vetoed the GOP-led Congressional Review Act resolution that would overturn the EPA truck emissions rules yesterday.
“This would take us backwards in our fight against air pollution, so I’m blocking it,” he said in a tweet.
That marks the sixth veto for Biden, four of which applied to CRAs relating to environmental or energy rules.
NETHERLANDS SLATED TO CLOSE EUROPE’S BIGGEST GAS FIELD THIS YEAR: European gas futures jumped by more than 30% today on the news that the Dutch government will permanently shut down Europe’s largest gas field in October, shortening the timeline by as much as 12 months, and at a time when the rest of the continent is bracing for its second winter season without most Russian energy supplies. The field is currently running on so-called pilot light, or minimum operation, but officials expect to extract as much as 2.8 bcm of gas from the field until its official shutdown.
The Netherlands had previously sought to close the Groningen gas field by October 2024 at the latest, but moved up the date amid political pressure caused by hundreds of earthquakes as a result of the site’s depletion.
More than 3,300 buildings have been demolished in the area since 2012 because the earthquakes have rendered them unsafe, according to data from the Groningen Mining Damage Institute, and plans are being weighed to fill the sites with concrete. Read more from Bloomberg here.
GERMAN COAL MINER TO INVEST $1.6 BILLION IN RENEWABLES DEVELOPMENT: The second-largest coal miner in Germany said it plans to invest $1.6 billion to develop renewable energy at one of its opencast lignite mines in eastern Germany, a major investment that comes as leaders in Berlin ramp up pressure to phase out reliance on the dirtiest fossil fuel and transition to renewable sources.
The company, LEAG, said it will develop 7 gigawatts of wind and solar power at its Boxberg mine by 2030, with the first gigawatt of generating capacity slated to be commissioned in four years time. The company will also build alongside it 3 gigawatt-hours of energy storage, and 2 gigawatts of hydrogen production.
By 2040, LEAG plans to develop up to 14 GW of renewable generation at the mine, LEAG large-scale energy storage chief Rainer Schiller told Bloomberg in an interview.
The news comes as Germany’s ruling coalition has sought to push up its deadline to phase out the country’s coal use to 2030, far earlier than its current goal of 2038.
The Rundown
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Wall Street Journal Shell’s new strategy avoids the toughest questions
