The Biden “Bipartisan” Infrastructure Bill Is A Climate Disaster

• LOGGING PROVISIONS IN INFRASTRUCTURE & BUDGET RECONCILIATION PACKAGES WOULD WORSEN THE CLIMATE CRISIS AND THREATEN PUBLIC HEALTH

My initial rapid read of the Senate infrastructure bill flagged the logging and climate flaws documented in this Report. While I focused on carbon capture and other fossil subsidies, I briefly mentioned the logging and others flaws in this August 19, 2021 post:

But just reading the table of contents of the bi-partisan infrastructure bill reveals lots of bad stuff.There are NEPA categorical exclusions to “streamline” regulatory review (and something called “one federal approval”), several exemptions & loopholes for logging, and privatization and deregulation.

The tradition highway construction funding will result in huge new greenhouse gas emissions. Perhaps the Congressional Budget Office might produce a “score” on this bill, not in terms of spending and effects on the deficit, but on quantifying the new carbon emissions the bill would create.

The Biden Neoliberal approach amounts to all carrots and no sticks (the bill has been dubbed “false solutions” – and “apocalypse soon”)

I have not read the current version of the budget reconciliation bill under negotiation.

For years, I’ve been trying to make the link between logging and climate and DEP failures in opposing what are relatively small logging projects here in NJ, e.g. see:

• Despite Gov. Murphy’s Climate Commitments, The Murphy DEP Continues To Log NJ Highlands Forests

So I’m glad John Muir made the effort to document them in the pending bills.

Here are the John Muir Report’s mind blowing Key Findings: