Gov. Chafee Creates Climate
Change Council
Text and
video by TIM FAULKNER/ecoRI.org News staff
WEST
WARWICK — A new statewide board is taking on climate change in Rhode Island.
Will it succeed where other efforts for comprehensive action have stalled?
Surrounded
by elected officials and state environmental leaders, Gov. Lincoln Chafee
signed an executive order Feb. 21 establishing the Rhode Island
Executive Climate Change Council (ECCC), a committee representing nine state
agencies. The new committee is directed to develop policies and legislation
that address the two main climate-change challenges: adapting to its impacts,
and reducing, or mitigating, carbon dioxide emissions.
The ECCC is the second statewide board to confront
climate change. In 2010, the General Assembly created the Climate Change
Commission in partnership with the Brown University Center for Environmental
Studies. The 29-member board consists of elected officials and local
environmental leaders. Due to a lack of funding, the committee meets
infrequently and issued only one report, in 2012.
The governor said inaction by Congress pushed him to create this new commission. “It’s unfortunate we have to make these decisions state by state, rather than federally," Chafee said. "I would have preferred that the national federal government had acted. That’s not occurring. There’s still the deniers out there about climate change.”
Kate
Brock, Chafee’s legislative liaison, said the Climate Change Commission will
serve in an advisory role to the new executive council.
Members
of the Climate Change Commission who attended the recent announcement weren’t
aware of their added responsibility. After hearing Brock’s comment, J. Timmons
Roberts, professor of environmental studies and sociology at Brown and one of
the main organizers of the Climate Change Commission, said he's in favor of
having the commission support the ECCC.
Roberts
said he also looks forward to climate change
legislation expected
soon in the General Assembly. Brown University officials, students, consultants
and members of the Climate Change Commission collaborated on the legislation,
which addresses climate change mitigation.
In
recent years, several bills addressing climate change adaptation and mitigation
failed to advance in the General Assembly.
Chafee
said the new council will advocate for protecting infrastructure, including the
installation of barriers around low-lying wastewater treatment plants, such as
the West Warwick facility that was submerged by flooding in 2010.
The
executive order, he said, has two goals. First, to take immediate action to cut
carbon emissions, such as increasing electric-vehicle use and reducing driving
by state agencies. State and municipal buildings will be more energy efficient.
The state will generate more renewable energy and import green power from
neighboring states and Canada. The second goal is to prepare the state for
extreme weather events by better informing the public. It also will mean
broad-scale improvements to roads, bridge and other infrastructure.
The ECCC
will seek funding from federal, state and private sources. Despite the costs,
Chafee said the initiative will boost the state’s economy. “Socially
responsible companies out there are going to want to go and do business where
there are socially responsible governments," he said.
Sen.
Sheldon Whitehouse. D-R.I., said taking on climate change is a battle “for the
future of our planet and the soul of our democracy.” Corporate interest groups
are funding a climate change-denial campaign in Washington, D.C., “that will go
down as one of the most cynical propaganda efforts in the history of our
country.”
Influential
corporate lobbyists, Whitehouse said, intentionally muddle the issue by saying
they believe climate change is occurring but say the problem is too complex for
taking specific actions to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
Whitehouse
said proof of climate change can be found in Narragansett Bay. The average
winter surface water temperature, he said, has increased 4 degrees during the
past 40 years. Sea level is 10 inches higher in the bay since the 1930s.
Eventually,
comprehensive action on climate change will happen, Whitehouse said. “But the
question will be ‘Did we get there in time? And did we do so much damage to our
democracy through this corruption that we’ve embarrassed ourselves in the eyes
of the world?’”
Jonathan
Stone, executive director of Save The Bay, said there are also inland
impacts from climate change. Woodlands, streams and rivers are threatened by
higher temperatures and invasive species. Rising groundwater tables impair
septic and storm drainage systems. Higher sea levels inundate storm-drain pipes
with seawater. “They don’t work as well when salt water comes up the
storm-drain pipe as opposed to rainwater going down the storm-drain pipe,"
he said.
Grover
Fugate, director of the Coastal Resources Management Council (CRMC), noted that
Rhode Island's success with the Ocean Special Area Management Plan (Ocean SAMP) proves that state
agencies work well together. “It is going to be a step that’s going to start to
put us back on the forefront and in a leadership position in the nation on this
issue," he said.
Chafee's
executive order also charges the council to support cities and towns with
resiliency planning, and to work with other New England states on climate
projects. Mitigation strategies includes creating short- and long-term
emission-reduction strategies and developing a green-economy infrastructure.
The ECCC
will update the governor May 1 and annually on the same date. A spokesman for
Chafee said it’s uncertain if legislation will be introduced this year.