A Bit Of Good News On Climate Change

Amid the news of storms and fire, floods and drought President-elect Biden has given those concerned with climate change some hope, announcing that former Secretary of State John Kerry will be his special envoy on climate change, and part of the national security team. The appointment is a strong statement confirming the president-elect’s commitment to make addressing the climate crisis a priority.

Ten years ago when Secretary Kerry was representing us in the Senate, the United States House had narrowly passed comprehensive legislation to reduce U.S. emissions of greenhouse gasses and promote clean energy. The Obama White House, preoccupied with the enactment of the health care legislation that became Obamacare, did not push for Senate action on climate change, and coal state Democrats were happy to have the House bill die in the Senate. Then Sen. Kerry worked tirelessly to find a legislative compromise on climate that could win votes from Republican moderates — the species had not yet gone extinct. The effort failed when the 2010 midterm elections brought angry, climate denying Tea Party conservatives to the fore. But Sen. Kerry had won wide respect for his deep expertise and commitment on climate.

When President Obama appointed Kerry to be Secretary of State during his second term, the senator brought his knowledge and commitment with him to the Department of State. He became the first Secretary of State to make climate action a personal priority while he was in office. Although the nations of the world (including the U.S. under the first George Bush) signed and ratified the Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992, over the next 25 years they could not agree on how to reduce emissions. Conflicts between rich and poor, and between coal-dependent nations like India and China and regions like the U.S. and Europe that are able to move beyond coal, had made cooperation almost impossible. Secretary Kerry went to work on the problem. He brought to bear all of the international influence of the United States. He raised the question of controlling emissions and helping the countries of the developing world to adapt to the growing impacts of warming in virtually every high-level meeting.

In Paris in late 2015, the exhausted representatives of almost two hundred countries reached agreement on what has come to be known as the Paris climate accord.

Secretary Kerry played a crucial role in securing that agreement. (He famously signed the Paris accord with a grandchild sitting on his lap.) Progress under the accord has been thrown off track by President Trump’s withdrawal, and it will be a moment for celebration when President Biden makes rejoining the accord a priority for his first day in office. Climate envoy Kerry will be a superb representative to nations that have been implementing the agreement over the last four years and view the off-again, on-again U.S. commitment with both relief and skepticism.

During the past four years, Secretary Kerry has continued to work on the issue as a private citizen, using his vast network of contacts to engineer action to reduce emissions despite the Trump administration’s vitriolic efforts to repeal, undo or ignore climate policies put in place by previous administrations. Secretary Kerry has been connected to a variety of advocacy efforts, and last summer he helped to launch the KFA Global Carbon Fund, an exchange traded fund designed to enlist Wall Street in the climate fight by creating a robust market for carbon reduction credits.

The appointment of this knowledgeable and deeply committed senior official to lead U.S. climate policy and diplomacy speaks volumes to our international partners, who know and trust him, to U.S. industry who cannot help but see how serious the new president is, and to the overwhelming majority of Americans who know global climate change is a huge threat to out security, our well-being and our future.

Massachusetts should be proud. Jonathan Lash, a former Hampshire College president, was president of the World Resources Institute from 1993 until 2011.