ENERGY,
PEACE AND CONFLICT, SUSTAINABILITY
The Impact of Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine on
Climate Change Policy
BY STEVE
COHEN |MARCH 7, 2022
Russia’s
horrific, terrifying invasion of Ukraine has focused attention on Russia’s role
as one of the world’s top three suppliers of fossil fuels. The United States,
Saudi Arabia and Russia are among the top nations in the greenhouse gas sales
business. As our economy has become more and more dependent on energy as a
necessity of daily life, the need for a reliable and affordable source of
energy has become ever more obvious. For all the problems with fossil fuels,
they remain our main source of energy. Although the fossil fuel industry would
like us to increase our dependence on their product, it is clearly not in our
interest to do so.
Even
setting aside the environmental damage caused by fossil fuel extraction and
burning, the volatility of supply and price fluctuations make it a particularly
problematic resource. The West’s ability to wage economic war against Russia
for their wanton destruction of a neighboring sovereign state is compromised by
our addiction to their fossil fuels. Europe is like a junkie trying to attack
its favorite drug pusher. Not a credible threat in the short run. The Europeans
know it, and as Somini Sengupta and Lisa Friedman reported in the New York
Times last week:
“Analysts
have said European countries can quickly reduce gas dependence with energy
efficiency measures and ramping up renewable energy investments, which are
already in line with Europe’s ambition to stop pumping additional greenhouse
gases into the atmosphere by midcentury. The conflict in Ukraine could
fast-track some of that. It could also lead to what Lisa Fischer, who follows
energy policy at E3G, a research group, called “a tectonic shift” — using
renewables, rather than ample gas storage, to achieve energy security.”
In the
U.S., the issue of energy security has been debated for half a century. The fragility of the energy supply in the
1970s resulted in a call for American energy independence and that call is now
being renewed by the drill-baby-drill crowd. That team was in charge during the
Trump Administration and despite their best efforts, they were unable to secure
independence. That is not because the United States lacks fossil fuels, but
because we are in a global economy, and there is no real way to keep
American-produced fuels in the U.S. if they can secure a higher price
elsewhere. The goal of energy independence has never been realistic; it is
simply an exercise in deceptive political symbolism. The only true way to
secure real energy independence is to break our dependence on fossil fuels.
Renewable energy is the ultimate form of energy independence since no sovereign
state owns the sun. Moreover, as innovation drives down the cost of technology
to convert solar and wind power to electricity, renewable energy will become
less and less expensive. Battery technology, essential due to the intermittent
nature of solar and wind power is also improving. Motor vehicle batteries are
becoming lighter while extending their range between charges.
In the near
term, climate advocates are concerned because the war and need for Russia’s
resources seem to have displaced climate change from the political agenda. I
think it is entirely reasonable to shift our focus from climate policy to
trying to stop a murderous lunatic from destroying Ukraine and then possibly
turning his attention to other nearby nations. While we scramble for energy
supplies to replace Russia’s fossil fuels, the long-term impact of this war
could and should be increased demand for renewable energy.
Interruptions
in global supply chains are renewing calls for America-first manufacturing and
supply lines. This, too, is more deceptive, political nonsense. American
manufacturing will grow with increased use of automation and artificial
intelligence, but not in response to nationalistic symbolism, but because the
reduced need for low-cost labor in manufacturing makes it feasible. More and
more of the global economy’s wealth is in services and creative production of
information, analysis, design, wellness, education, and entertainment. The
global, high-tech, brain-based economy is here to stay. The technology of
communication, information and transportation makes global production the best
way to produce high-quality, low-cost goods and services. Interruptions from
COVID, climate impacts and war will disrupt but not destroy global supply
chains. We can expect companies to seek redundant suppliers to deal with
disruptions, but the global economy will continue its relentless march.
Which
brings me back to climate policy. The Biden administration’s proposed $500
billion subsidy to accelerate decarbonization and adapt to climate change are
important initiatives. When the horror in Ukraine ends or at least pauses, this
element of the Build Back Better bill should be revived. The radical right-wing
Supreme Court may well gut the Clean Air Act and contradict its earlier George
W. Bush-era decision that defined greenhouse gasses as a dangerous pollutant
requiring EPA regulation. Corporate, state, and local decarbonization efforts
will continue anyway. In the famous words of Bob Dylan, “you don’t need a
weatherman to know which way the wind blows.” This is especially obvious during
a climate-amplified hurricane, flood, or forest fire. Most American
institutions are starting to pay attention to climate change. But the federal
government’s role in supporting decarbonization is crucial. The Supreme Court’s
justices live on Earth along with the rest of us and they should save their
anti-regulatory ideological zeal for a policy area that does not pose an
existential threat to life as we know it. The Biden team imbedded climate
policy in the infrastructure bill and are also utilizing federal purchasing power
to help build the green economy. These are important steps, but the challenges
of decarbonization will be profound. We need to extend our efforts into the
developing world as well since we all share a single biosphere.
The effort
to reduce greenhouse gas pollution will be a generation-long process. Unlike
many other forms of pollution, carbon dioxide from fossil fuels and methane
emitted from agriculture and waste are deeply imbedded throughout our economy.
The process of reducing these pollutants will take time. But I am confident
that with ingenuity and determination, we can reduce these dangerous
pollutants. When we get this form of pollution under control, we will then need
to reduce the long-term accumulation of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere with
government-funded carbon capture and storage.
In the
meantime, it is entirely appropriate to focus on the growing catastrophe in
Ukraine. My long-term concern with environmental sustainability assumes that
our leaders live in the real world and have a reverence for the planet and its
well-being. It is obvious that Putin cares for neither people nor the planet.
His delusions are exponentially greater and more dangerous than any climate or
COVID denier could ever be. The global effort to delegitimize Putin is more
important than any other issue on our political agenda. Fighting lethal force
with economic and political power may prove to be insufficient, but it is
entirely necessary. The scenes of suffering in Ukraine are heart-breaking. The
recklessness of the Russian invasion was never more apparent than last week’s
attack and near destruction of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in
southeastern Ukraine. We will return to the long-term threat of global warming
soon enough. For now, the people of Ukraine deserve our help, support, and
prayers
The environmental costs of Russia’s invasion of
Ukraine
"Fighting around these sites risks generating
extreme toxic pollution."
Diana
Kruzman
Midwest
Correspondent
Published
Feb 25,
2022
https://grist.org/international/environmental-costs-of-russias-invasion-of-ukraine/
As Russian
forces stepped up their assault on Ukrainian cities Thursday, escalating a
long-simmering conflict into a full-scale invasion, observers warned that this
most recent round of violence could cause further long-lasting devastation to
the environment.
On Twitter,
the United Nations Environment Programme pleaded for a ceasefire “to ensure the
safety of all people and the environment that sustains life on the planet.”
Others worried about the potential fallout from intense fighting around the
Chernobyl nuclear power plant, or raised concerns that artillery could hit one
of Ukraine’s four operating nuclear power plants, releasing radioactive
contamination that could spread throughout the region and last thousands of
years.
In
Ukraine’s east, where Russian forces have been supporting two breakaway regions
in an eight-year war, researchers warned that Ukraine’s industrial
infrastructure, electric grid or chemical plants could become a target.
“Eastern
Ukraine is full of industrial sites like metallurgical plants, chemical
factories, power stations and run-down mines,” Richard Pearshouse, the head of
Crisis and the Environment at Amnesty International, told Grist in an email.
“Fighting around these sites risks generating extreme toxic pollution, with
severe health impacts worsening the already horrific humanitarian crisis for
local people.”
Fighting in
dense urban areas, in particular, poses a high risk because of the chance that
artillery will accidentally hit a vulnerable site. But intentionally targeting
this kind of civilian infrastructure, Pearshouse told Grist, would be illegal
under the laws of war. He urged military commanders to “take all feasible
precautions to minimize harm to civilians and civilian objects.”
The ongoing
conflict also has reverberations far beyond Ukraine, as the country — known as
the “breadbasket of Europe” — is a major supplier of crops for nations around
the world. Ukraine ships more than 40 percent of its wheat and corn exports to
the Middle East and Africa, regions that already struggle with food shortages
and could face further instability as a result of any disruptions. A large
portion of these exports come from the country’s threatened eastern regions,
and fighting that extends beyond separatist-controlled areas could increase
food insecurity, the United Nations warned.
“Interruption
to the flow of grain out of the Black Sea region will increase prices and add
further fuel to food inflation at a time when its affordability is a concern
across the globe following the economic damage caused by the Covid-19
pandemic,” David Beasley, executive director of the World Food Programme, said
in a statement.
Fears of
environmental catastrophe in Ukraine are not new, and have been keenly felt in
the parts of the country most exposed to the conflict that began in 2014 and
has already killed over 13,000 people. Eastern Ukraine, an area known as the
Donbas, is heavily industrialized and even before the war was known as one of
the country’s most polluted regions. It struggled to deal with toxic waste from
a history of coal mining, metallurgy and chemical manufacturing; after the war
began, many of its operating factories had to shut down, raising the risks that
they would pollute the environment as they languished.
Years of
war have already degraded the region’s water infrastructure and polluted local
rivers. Water supplies have been cut off at multiple points throughout the
fighting, making essential tasks like cooking, drinking and hand-washing a
“daily challenge,” according to UNICEF, the United Nations’ child welfare
agency. The organization has recorded more than 450 cases of military damage to
water infrastructure in the region since 2016, Politico reported; last week,
dozens of towns lost access to water after a pipeline was damaged by shelling.
In the
regions controlled by separatists, the degradation of wastewater infrastructure
has sent untreated sewage into the Donetsk River, posing health risks to the
people who rely on it for their water supplies. Dozens of mines containing
radioactive material and heavy metals like mercury, lead, and arsenic, which
naturally fill with water that needs to be pumped out, were abandoned, allowing
them to flood and potentially contaminate the groundwater. Unexploded ordnance
left over after fighting, while posing a direct threat to civilians, has also
polluted waterways in the area, releasing toxic chemicals through the
surrounding soil, according to a 2020 paper in the Small Wars Journal.
Frequent
shelling and landmines, compounded by the drying effects of climate change,
have also made the region more susceptible to wildfires. In 2018, the United
Nations reported that conflict in the Donbas had destroyed at least 530,000
hectares of land, including 18 nature reserves. Much of this was burned in more
than 12,000 forest fires blazing near the combat zone, some of which were
believed to have been sparked by artillery strikes.
“Donbas is
on the precipice of an ecological catastrophe fueled by air, soil and water
pollution from the combustion of large amounts of ammunition in the fighting
and flooding at industrial plants,” Leila Urekenova, an analyst for the UN
Environment Programme, said at the time. “There is an urgent need for
ecological monitoring to assess and minimize the environmental risks arising
from the armed conflict.”
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