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      Biden Underestimates How Much Black Americans Care About This Issue

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      Black voters will not only be a driving force in the 2024 elections; they will most likely be the driving force. Recent polls showed that roughly 20 percent of Black voters said they would probably vote for Donald Trump if the election were held today — the highest level of Black support for any Republican presidential candidate since the civil rights era. An additional 8 percent said they wouldn’t vote at all.Democratic campaign officials are rightly worried, but there’s still time for President Biden to make up the ground he has lost. One way he could do it is by talking to Black America, especially young Black voters, about a sleeper issue: the climate crisis.As an environment and climate researcher, I have found that despite the growing threat posed by climate change, politicians often seem to downplay the crisis when courting Black communities. Democratic strategists seem to see climate change as a key political issue only for white liberal elites and assume that other groups, like Black voters, are either unaware of or apathetic about it.In reality, Black Americans are growing increasingly concerned about climate change.An April poll from CBS News showed that 88 percent of Black adults said it was “somewhat” or “very important.” That makes sense: The most severe harms from climate change, from heat waves to extreme flooding, are already falling disproportionately on their communities. And it’s starting to be reflected in their political priorities. A poll conducted by the Brookings Institution last September showed that climate change is now a greater political concern for Black Americans than abortion or the state of democracy.If Democrats are serious about making inroads with some of the people they have lost in these communities, they should begin by talking to voters about what the climate crisis looks like for them. In major Democratic strongholds such as Cleveland, Milwaukee and Philadelphia, heat waves and flooding are driving up electricity bills and destroying homes. If Mr. Biden were to routinely speak about these challenges and commit to creating forums for Black Americans to discuss climate concerns with government officials, his administration could earn back some of the faith it has squandered.As a start, Mr. Biden could focus more intently on young Black people, a group passionate about climate change. Until May 19, when he gave the commencement address at Morehouse College, the president had largely refrained from direct engagement with young Black audiences on the campaign trail. When he speaks to Black voters, climate often is a footnote, or it’s mentioned in a policy buffet along with the economy, abortion and voting rights. During his speech at Morehouse, he mentioned the climate crisis explicitly only in a stray line about “heeding your generation’s call to a community free of gun violence and a planet free of climate crisis and showing your power to change the world.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      DeSantis Signs Law Deleting Climate Change From Florida Policy

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      The law also stops programs designed to encourage renewable energy and conservation in a state that is highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.Florida’s state government will no longer be required to consider climate change when crafting energy policy under legislation signed Wednesday by Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican.The new law, which passed the Florida Legislature in March and takes effect on July 1, will also prohibit the construction of offshore wind turbines in state waters and will repeal state grant programs that encourage energy conservation and renewable energy.The legislation also deletes requirements that state agencies use climate-friendly products and purchase fuel-efficient vehicles. And it prevents any municipality from restricting the type of fuel that can be used in an appliance, such as a gas stove.The legislation, along with two other bills Mr. DeSantis signed on Wednesday, “will keep windmills off our beaches, gas in our tanks, and China out of our state,” the governor wrote on the social media platform X. “We’re restoring sanity in our approach to energy and rejecting the agenda of the radical green zealots.”Florida is one of the states most vulnerable to the costly and deadly impacts of climate change, which is largely driven by the burning of oil, gas and coal. Multiple scientific studies have shown that the increase of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has contributed to sea level rise and more flooding in the state’s coastal cities.Last year was the hottest in Florida since 1895, and the waters off its coast heated to 90 degrees during the summer, bleaching corals and scorching marine life. Hurricane Idalia made landfall on Aug. 30 near Keaton Beach and caused an estimated $3.6 billion in damages. The year before, Hurricane Ian was blamed for more than 140 deaths and $109.5 billion in damages in Florida, becoming the costliest hurricane in state history, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Podesta Meets With China’s Climate Envoy Amid Deep Economic Tensions

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      Beijing’s dominance raises economic and security concerns, and tensions will be on full display as top climate diplomats meet this week.The world’s two most powerful countries, the United States and China, are meeting this week in Washington to talk about climate change. And also their relationship issues.In an ideal world, where the clean energy transition was the top priority, they would be on friendlier terms. Maybe affordable Chinese-made electric vehicles would be widely sold in America, instead of being viewed as an economic threat. Or there would be less need to dig a lithium mine at an environmentally sensitive site in Nevada, because lithium, which is essential for batteries, could be bought worry-free from China, which controls the world’s supply.Instead, in the not-ideal real world, the United States is balancing two competing goals. The Biden administration wants to cut planet-warming emissions by encouraging people to buy things like EVs and solar panels, but it also wants people to buy American, not Chinese. Its concern is that Chinese dominance of the global market for these essential technologies would harm the U.S. economy and national security.Those competing goals will be on vivid display this week, as the Biden Administration’s top climate envoy, John Podesta, meets for the first time with his counterpart from Beijing, Liu Zhenmin, in Washington.Trade tensions are likely to loom over their talks.The flood of Chinese exports, particularly in solar panels and other green-energy technology, has become a real sore spot for the Biden administration as it tries to spur the same industries on American soil. Mr. Podesta has sharply criticized China for having “distorted the global market for clean energy products like solar, batteries and critical minerals.”Not only that, he has set up a task force to explore how to limit exports from countries that have high carbon footprints, a practice that he called “carbon dumping.” That was considered a veiled reference to China.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The Last Coal-Fired Power Plants in New England Are to Close

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      The company that owns the Merrimack and Schiller stations in New Hampshire plans to turn them into solar farms and battery storage for offshore wind.The last two coal-fired power plants in New England are set to close by 2025 and 2028, ending the use of a fossil fuel that supplied electricity to the region for more than 50 years.The decision to close the Merrimack and Schiller stations, both in New Hampshire, makes New England the second region in the country, after the Pacific Northwest, to stop burning coal.Environmentalists waged a five-year legal battle against the New Hampshire plants, saying that the owner had discharged warm water from steam turbines into a nearby river without cooling it first to match the natural temperature.In a settlement reached on Wednesday with the Sierra Club and the Conservative Law Foundation, Granite Shore Power, the owner of the plants, agreed that Schiller would not run after Dec. 31, 2025 and that Merrimack would cease operations no later than June 2028.“This announcement is the culmination of years of persistence and dedication from so many people across New England,” said Gina McCarthy, a former national climate adviser to President Biden and former administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency during the Obama administration who is now a senior adviser at Bloomberg Philanthropies, which supports efforts to phase out coal.“I’m wicked proud to live in New England today and be here,” Ms. McCarthy said. “Every day, we’re showing the rest of the country that we will secure our clean energy future without compromising.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Yellen to Warn China Against Flood of Cheap Green Energy Exports

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      The Treasury secretary, who plans to make her second trip to China soon, will argue that the country’s excess industrial production warps supply chains.The Biden administration is growing increasingly concerned that a glut of heavily subsidized green technology exports from China is distorting global markets and plans to confront Chinese officials about the problem during an upcoming round of economic talks in Beijing.The tension over industrial policy is flaring as the United States invests heavily in production of solar technology and electric vehicle batteries with funding from the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, while China pumps money into its factory sector to help stimulate its sluggish economy. President Biden and Xi Jinping, China’s leader, have sought to stabilize the relationship between the world’s two largest economies, but differences over trade policy, investment restrictions and cyberespionage continue to strain ties.In a speech on Wednesday afternoon, Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen will lay out her plans to raise the issue of overcapacity with her Chinese counterparts. At the Suniva solar cell factory in Norcross, Ga., she will warn that China’s export strategy threatens to destabilize global supply chains that are developing around industries such as solar, electric vehicles and lithium-ion batteries, according to a copy of her prepared remarks reviewed by The New York Times.“China’s overcapacity distorts global prices and production patterns and hurts American firms and workers, as well as firms and workers around the world,” Ms. Yellen will say. “Challenges for individual firms can lead to concentrated supply chains, negatively impacting global economic resilience.”The Treasury secretary is expected to make her second trip to China in the coming weeks. The South China Morning Post reported that she will visit Guangzhou and Beijing in early April. The Treasury Department declined to comment on her travel plans.In her speech in Georgia, Ms. Yellen will compare China’s investments in green energy technology production to what she described as its previous overinvestment in steel and aluminum, saying it created “global spillovers.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Former Ohio House Speaker Hit With 10 Additional Felony Charges

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      Larry Householder, already serving a 20-year federal prison sentence, was indicted on additional state felony charges on Monday in connection with a sprawling bribery scheme.A former speaker of the Ohio State House of Representatives, now serving a 20-year federal prison sentence, was indicted on 10 more state felony charges on Monday in connection with a sprawling bribery scheme that handed a $1.3 billion bailout to a major regional energy utility.The charges against the former speaker, Larry Householder, followed an inquiry by the Ohio Organized Crime Commission that also produced indictments last month of two former executives of the Akron-based utility, FirstEnergy Corporation.The two men — Chuck Jones, a former FirstEnergy chief executive officer, and Michael Dowling, a senior vice president — were charged with funneling $4.3 million in bribes to the former chairman of the Ohio Public Utility Commission, Sam Randazzo. They and Mr. Randazzo, who was also indicted, have pleaded not guilty to a total of 27 charges.The FirstEnergy case has been called the largest political scandal in Ohio history. Mr. Householder was convicted of accepting $60 million in bribes in exchange for shepherding into law a mammoth bailout of two unprofitable nuclear power plants owned by a subsidiary of the utility, as well as two coal-fired electric plants and solar energy projects.Mr. Householder, 64, is appealing his racketeering conviction, which took place in federal court last June. Among other things, the new state charges assert that he illegally tapped a campaign account to pay $750,000 in legal fees for his defense and that he failed to disclose loans, debts, legal fees and gifts from lobbyists in ethics statements required of members of the state legislature.The charges — three counts of theft, five counts of record-tampering and single counts of money laundering and telecommunications fraud — could permanently bar Mr. Householder from public office if convicted.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      China Sets Economic Growth Target of About 5%

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      Premier Li Qiang targets growth of about 5 percent this year but signals continued reluctance to use deficit spending for economic stimulus.China’s top leaders on Tuesday set an ambitious target for economic growth but they signaled only modest stimulus measures, not the aggressive support for China’s domestic economy that many analysts believe is necessary to halt a steep slide in the housing market and ease consumer malaise and investor wariness.Premier Li Qiang, the country’s No. 2 official after Xi Jinping, said in his report to the annual session of the legislature that the government would seek economic growth of “around 5 percent.” That is the same target that China’s leadership set for last year, when official statistics ended up showing that the country’s gross domestic product grew 5.2 percent.The country’s program for state spending showed little change. Mr. Li said that the central government’s deficit would be set at 3 percent of economic output, but that the government was ready to issue another $140 billion worth of bonds to pay for unspecified projects of national importance. The more the government borrows, the more it can spend on initiatives that could boost the economy.China had also set the deficit at 3 percent early last year, before raising it in October to 3.8 percent when the government approved $140 billion in additional bonds to pay for disaster relief and prevention measures after severe summer flooding.Conspicuously missing from the premier’s agenda for this year was a move to shore up the country’s social safety net or introduce other policies, like vouchers or coupons, that would directly address Chinese consumers’ very weak confidence and unwillingness to spend money.“There’s a lot of positive noises for the economy, but not a lot of concrete proposals for how to resolve the country’s growth difficulties,” said Neil Thomas, a fellow at the Center for China Analysis of the Asia Society.

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      China consumer confidence index
      Source: China National Bureau of StatisticsBy The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      A.I. Frenzy Complicates Efforts to Keep Power-Hungry Data Sites Green

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      West Texas, from the oil rigs of the Permian Basin to the wind turbines twirling above the High Plains, has long been a magnet for companies seeking fortunes in energy.Now, those arid ranch lands are offering a new moneymaking opportunity: data centers.Lancium, an energy and data center management firm setting up shop in Fort Stockton and Abilene, is one of many companies around the country betting that building data centers close to generating sites will allow them to tap into underused clean power.“It’s a land grab,” said Lancium’s president, Ali Fenn.In the past, companies built data centers close to internet users, to better meet consumer requests, like streaming a show on Netflix or playing a video game hosted in the cloud. But the growth of artificial intelligence requires huge data centers to train the evolving large-language models, making proximity to users less necessary.But as more of these sites start to pop up across the United States, there are new questions on whether they can meet the demand while still operating sustainably. The carbon footprint from the construction of the centers and the racks of expensive computer equipment is substantial in itself, and their power needs have grown considerably.Just a decade ago, data centers drew 10 megawatts of power, but 100 megawatts is common today. The Uptime Institute, an industry advisory group, has identified 10 supersize cloud computing campuses across North America with an average size of 621 megawatts.This growth in electricity demand comes as manufacturing in the United States is the highest in the past half-century, and the power grid is becoming increasingly strained.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More