In two recent newsletters, Congressman Morgan Griffith blasted efforts to move away from fossil fuels to clean energy. He seized upon a recent cold snap to praise coal and characterize clean energy as unreliable. This misinformation parallels the “it’s cold, so there can’t be such a thing as global warming,” misconception exploited by Trump and other climate change deniers. As someone said recently in response, saying there’s no global warming because it’s cold outside is like saying there’s no global hunger because we just had a nice meal. During that cold snap I saw Al Roker on television patiently explaining that climate and weather are two different things. Good luck, Al, when the President and members of congress are reading from the fossil fuel industry’s talking points.
Griffith claims that those in favor of clean energy have “spun” the reality of climate change to make it seem much more of an emergency than it actually is. In fact, global warming is proceeding just as scientists said it would, but at a faster pace than anticipated. He claims that retooling our energy infrastructure to produce clean energy would destroy our economy. This is by no means certain, as thousands of new jobs would be created. But more importantly, Griffith fails to acknowledge the destruction that is occurring to our economy right now precisely because of global warming. Violent storms, exacerbated by warming ocean temperatures, have destroyed thousands of homes, businesses, factories and military installations. The southeast United States has been drowning. As a friend in the insurance business told me last May, “All I do is tell upset customers ‘I’m sorry, but you don’t have flood insurance.’” That’s understandable, since most of us haven’t needed it in this part of the country until recently.
Congressman Griffith mocks the comparison of the current battle against global warming to the battle against foreign foes in WWII. The analogy is valid in this regard: The task at hand was understood as arduous but necessary, and was executed with incredible bravery, ingenuity and speed. Before Pearl Harbor our economy functioned one way; afterwards it functioned in a different and incredibly robust way.
Finally Griffith suggests that we should continue to fill the environment with greenhouse gasses because China is doing it. It’s true China is now the world’s biggest polluter; but they have cut back emissions more than they pledged to do in the Paris Agreement. If you remember, that’s the international agreement signed by 195 nations, including the United States, to fight global warming. Trump pulled the U.S. out of the agreement almost immediately after taking office.
Kurt Merchant
Martinsville
