WORT 89.9FM Madison · Cheap Gas Undercuts Climate Change Progress

In a 2020 presidential debate in Nashville, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden said he would “transition away from the oil industry” to mitigate the effects of fossil fuels on climate change.  Two years later, President Biden has ordered the sale of 195 million barrels of oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserves – the largest release in history.  At the same time, the Biden Administration has opened up domestic oil drilling again, and unsuccessfully lobbied the Saudi Arabian government and OPEC to ramp up oil production.  All of this has been done in an attempt to lower gasoline prices that had soared following the Russo-Ukrainian War.  With the U.S. midterms coming up, is our climate future being sacrificed for short-term political gain?  Professor Gregory Nemet researches energy systems and environmental policy at the University of Wisconsin’s LaFollette Institute.

Photo of ExxonMobil oil refinery in Baton Rouge, Louisiana by WClarke, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

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