The Pentagon claims fighting climate change is among its top priorities. But Jacob Parakilas warns in The Diplomat that the hideous increase in natural disasters due to climate will require the American armed forces to leap into continuous action to rescue millions of soggy parched refugees which will require, um, fossil-fuel-powered craft because the other stuff is useless junk. Oh darn. And what if other important activities required them as well and not just getting Kerry to the awards ceremony on time?
Parakilas mocks the “glib answer” to the Pentagon’s needs, namely “hybrid Humvees and compostable MREs”, because “The single largest contributor to the military’s carbon footprint is its air operations, which are inherently difficult to decarbonize.” Man. There’s a slogan for you. “Inherently difficult to decarbonize”.
As Rudyard Kipling once said, via Billy the mule, “giving a thing a long name doesn’t make it any better.” And as Eric Worrall points out, it’s not just your local Apache helicopter that doesn’t work so good on compost. In the civilian economy too, an electric milk cart is all fine and good. But “for longer journeys, with unpredictable distances, where cost is a concern, or where time is a factor, carbon friendly technology options are an inconvenience or worse."
President Biden has mandated that all American government vehicles shall be “carbon pollution-free electricity and clean, zero-emission vehicles to create good-paying, union jobs and stimulate clean energy industries.” And Worrall scoffs “Libertarians rejoice! Thanks to President Biden’s latest climate brainstorm, in the future the US Federal Government will only function within 200 miles of the nearest operational EV charging station, and only when a fully charged EV is available in the car pool.” But, he adds soberly, “I suspect government employees working in remote regions will try to cling on to their gasoline and diesel vehicles, so the process of Federal withdrawal from unpowered regions may take a long time.”
We guess that important or self-important ones in major urban centres will do the same. Starting with the President himself, whose limousine, helicopter and Air Force One will still run on good old American petroleum products. And rapidly extending to his jet-setting aristocratic big-shot climate envoy.
Have all these politicians forgotten their grade 9 science? That is when I first studied photosynthesis. Our food is all carbon based, i.e. carbohydrate and is a product of carbon dioxide and water. If anything, to feed a growing population we will need more CO2 feedstock not less. As a crop science /plant physiologist, I can attest to the hundreds of published research papers that show increased yields along with other benefits such as improved water use efficiency from increased atmospheric CO2. Do not abandon the technology that has reduced hunger to the least extent ever on a worldwide basis.