Biden announces a battery of measures against climate change after shipwrecking the legislative route due to the rejection of a senator

President Joe Biden arrives this Wednesday at Warwick Airport (Rhode Island). JONATHAN ERNST (REUTERS)

A year and a half of efforts in pursuit of ambitious legislation against climate change in the US collapsed last week due to the refusal of Democratic Senator Joe Manchin, closely linked to the coal industry, to support it in the upper house, where they tie seats. Democrats and Republicans.

That is why President Joe Biden has had no choice but to resort to his executive power to bridge the legislative vacuum, with a salvo of measures to address this "existential threat to the United States and the world" as soon as possible.

All this when more than 100 million Americans, almost a third of the population, are on extreme heat alert, with temperatures that can exceed 40 degrees this week in some states and cities.

New York, for example,

Many expected a climate emergency declaration, but, on the eve of the decisive mid-term elections in November, which may give control of Congress to Republicans, the Democrat has opted for an intermediate solution, a battery of "executive actions", focused on protecting the most vulnerable communities to the lost impact of the climate, promoting wind energy projects on the country's coast and, incidentally, creating

jobs

, an old promise from his electoral campaign.

"If the Senate does not take action to address the climate crisis and strengthen our national clean energy industry, I will take strong executive action to meet this moment," Biden warned Friday, after learning of Manchin's setback.

The president has chosen for the announcement an old coal-fired power plant in Somerset (Massachusetts) that will be converted into a cable manufacturing facility for Iberdrola's offshore wind industry, a symbol of the environmental turnaround of the Democratic Administration.

The objective is to reduce emissions, combat environmental injustice - millions of low-income households are infinitely more exposed to extreme weather events - and, incidentally, the volatility of energy prices, highlighted by the war of Ukraine.

A horizon of energy security and efficiency to which the pressure of inflation on the pockets of Americans and on the electoral expectations of the Democrats is not unrelated.

Among the measures announced today is an investment of 2.3 billion dollars this fiscal year to finance a fund to support buildings and communities resilient to extreme events.

This funding will help communities increase their response to heat waves, droughts, wildfires, floods, hurricanes, and other hazards, before a catastrophe strikes.

In addition, an energy aid program will be reinforced for low-income households, so that they can afford to pay the electricity bill for the use of air conditioning or heating, as well as the creation of new cold centers in disadvantaged communities.

For the other major measure, expanding opportunities and jobs in the offshore wind energy sector, Washington is proposing the first wind generation areas in the Gulf of Mexico,

with an extension of 700,000 acres (about 283,000 hectares) and the potential to feed more than three million homes.

The Administration will also advance its plans to develop wind energy in the waters of the central and southern Atlantic coast and the Gulf of Florida.

Last year alone, the US experienced 20 natural disasters due to extreme weather, with losses that together exceeded 145,000 million dollars.

People of color and underserved communities are disproportionately affected, while basic infrastructure continually succumbs to extreme conditions.

This week, several episodes of torrential rain in New York turned some subway stations into waterfalls, not to mention the floods that last September claimed fifteen lives in various buildings in the city.

In the pipeline, perhaps for future announcements, there are measures to curb oil drilling on federal lands and waters.

Constrained by energy prices that have pushed inflation to record highs, the president liberalized domestic crude oil production last April, by granting exploitation permits on federal land, in an attempt to lower the price of a barrel of crude oil. .

In addition, the White House promised in March to increase the shipment of liquefied natural gas to Europe by 68%, to reduce the energy dependence of the Old Continent on Russia.

Repeated tripping by centrist West Virginia Senator Manchin, who owes his personal fortune and campaign base to the fossil fuel industry, has pushed Biden to

action rather than trade it as his approval rating hits record lows. (between 33% and 36%, according to the polls) and the prospects of a victory in November are elusive, mainly due to inflation and the clouds of economic uncertainty.