Category Archives: climate change

Bending the Knee Paid Immediate Dividends for the Governor… Not

Leave a reply

It was a little more than a week ago that Gov. Phil Scott held an unpublicized-until-after-the-fact meeting with EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin. The only notice anyone received of the event was a post on the governor’s Facebook page, which included a bunch of photos and a brief caption. Which is all we know about the meeting, since the press apparently got no advance notice.

But yeah, you might hope that Scott’s dignity would have at least bought him a little breathing room from the Trump administration’s savage and unconstitutional cuts in federal spending, especially where Zeldin himself is concerned.

I regret to inform you that any such hopes were completely unfounded.

The Scott-Zeldin confab was on Sunday, August 3. Well, four days later, on August 7, Zeldin delivered a swift kick in the nuts to our groveling governor: The Trump administration announced a clawback of $62.5 million in already-appropriated federal funds meant for Vermont’s Solar for All program, designed to help lower-income people access the benefits of solar power. (The cut was first reported by VTDigger, um, today.) It was part of a larger, nationwide cut in the program, but that’s one hell of a lot of money we’re not going to get, that won’t help a lot of lower-income people take advantage of the Green Revolution or build out our renewable infrastructure or reduce our dependence on out-of-state fossil fuel.

Accompanying the announcement was a cheery little video message from Zeldin himself, labeling Solar for All, a brainchlld of Vermont’s own Sen. Bernie Sanders, ” as a “grift” and a “boondoggle.”

Continue reading →

Sorry, But I’m With the Litigious Developer On This One

7 Replies

Friday afternoon brought us, courtesy of VTDigger, a fascinating story from down Bennington way, where local officials have basically waved the white flag over a proposed solar array north of town, planned by “solar developer and lawyer Thomas Melone.” Melone has been highly litigious in this matter, and numerous cases are pending before the courts. Apparently the town Parental Figures have decided to stop paying lawyers and let Melone have his way.

And you know what? In this case, the litigious plutocrat is the good guy.

I’ll sit back for a moment and let the brickbats fly.

Now, I don’t know the history of the case. But I sure as hell recognize a flaming outbreak of the NIMBYs when I see it, and this is a classic example. The opposition to this development goes to outrageous lengths to make its case. Reading this story made me wonder how in holy Hell we will ever get close to meeting our emissions reductions targets. Which, reminder, are established in state law.

Continue reading →

Big Boy, Big Little Toys (UPDATED With Astonishingly Well-Timed April Fools Day Prank)

Leave a reply

The Monday VTDigger feed brings us some not terribly surprising news: That Gov. Phil Scott is apparently enamored of an emerging technology as a way to produce more renewable energy in-state.

Well, some would put quotes around “renewable,” because his gizmo of choice is a new generation of small modular nuclear reactors. See, large-scale wind and solar are just too much for our poor Vermont environment to take, but hey, let’s spread a bunch of mini-nukes around the landscape. What could go wrong?

It was a fine piece of reporting by Digger, written by intern Olivia Gieger*, inspired by a March 21 social media post by the governor (that otherwise seems to have gone unnoticed) touting small reactors as a possible solution to our green-energy problems.

*Insert obligatory “counter” joke here. I’m sure she’s never heard it before.

Continue reading →

“Governor Nice Guy” Is Out There Pickin’ Fights With the Legislature

5 Replies

Gotta start using air quotes around that appellation for our chief executive, because he seems to be going out of his way to antagonize the Legislature and prepare the fields for another bushel of his administration’s chief cash crop, gubernatorial vetoes. It’s funny, after all that talk about coming to the table and working across the aisle, he’s back in his comfort zone: confrontational mode.

You know, if Phil Scott was a politician — which he continually insists he is not — I’d say he had absorbed the lessons of the 2024 election and decided the path to victory was in demonizing his opponents. It’s smart politics. But it’s anything but nice.

Exhibit A: VTDigger reports that the Scott administration has finally, belatedly, delivered its full public education reform plan in actual legislative language.

On February 25. Almost two months into a five-month session. Three days before the Legislature adjourns for Town Meeting Week. Little more than three weeks before crossover, when any policy bill must have been passed by one chamber if it’s to have any real chance of passing the other this year. It’s just not possible for lawmakers to give due consideration to such a massive reorganization in such a short window of time.

Continue reading →

Kicking the Can All the Way to 2050

4 Replies

We already knew Gov. Phil Scott has called for a full-scale retreat from fighting climate change. But in his January 30 press conference, he made it clear he not only wants to eliminate any mandatory emissions reduction targets this side of 2050, avoid any potential legal challenge over the state’s failure to meet 2025 or 2030 targets, extract all the teeth from the Climate Action Council, implement a much more permissive measuring stick for emissions, and weaken the Renewable Energy Standard, but he overtly stated he wants no further action at all for another two years.

Yep. He had already tasked his officials with devising a plan to meet the 2050 emissions targets. But in his presser, he specified the delivery date for that plan.

December of 2026.

Sure, let’s put a freeze on climate policy while his administration takes its sweet damn time coming up with a 25-year plan — and finalizes it after the next election. When Scott might well be on his way out of the corner office. If this term is his last, this marvelous two-year effort is bound for the dustbin of history.

But really, the point is not to create an actionable blueprint. It’s to take himself off the hook for climate action anytime soon.

Continue reading →

The Brave, the Bold, and The Bleh

2 Replies

Our brand new lieutenant governor has yet to learn the fine art of sitting within camera range during a big event. During Gov. Phil Scott’s budget address Tuesday, John Rodgers spent most of his time looking bored, which isn’t a great thing when he’s supposedly cheerleading for his fellow Republican,.

In fairness to Rodgers, it wasn’t the most inspiring of occasions. Scott’s much-touted budget address was kind of a tepid affair. The freshly reinforced Republican ranks in the House and Senate gave the governor some hoots and whistles as he entered and departed, but only managed a pair of half-hearted standing ovations during the speech.

I guess we shouldn’t expect anything different after eight years of this guy. But he and his minions have been talking a lot about bold action in 2025. And while there were bits of bravery peeking out here and there — like pushing his fairly radical public school reorganization plan and officially calling for a full retreat on climate action* — there was a hell of a lot more incrementalism. A whole bunch of initiatives with teeny-tiny price tags (on the scale of a $9 billion dollar budget), many more in $2-3 million range than anything truly impactful.

*”Brave” and “stupid” are not mutually exclusive.

There was also one huge omission. Scott never once mentioned the threat posed by Donald Trump to the federal funding that pays for so much of what state government does. He didn’t address any contingency planning or possible budgetary adjustments. It was a glaring omission on the very day when VTDigger reported that Team Scott “is trying to understand the potentially sweeping statewide impact” of Trump’s broad freeze on federal spending.

Maybe that’s because many of Vermont’s new Republican lawmakers are diehard Trumpers, and Scott might have gotten an unfortunate reaction from his “friends” if he said anything that even hinted at criticism of Trump’s scorched-earth approach to governance.

Continue reading →

Blowin’ Smoke on the Clean Heat Standard

7 Replies

For the better part of a year, Gov. Phil Scott has been blasting the Clean Heat Standard by claiming it could cost Vermonters a billion dollars or more. It became a big part of the Republicans’ campaign to blast legislative Democrats for making Vermont unaffordable.

Well, about that. Last week, the Public Utility Commission — whose members were appointed by Scott and who have collectively been doing their best to block or slow the growth of renewable energy in Vermont — came out with a radically lower cost estimate. According to the PUC, the Clean Heat Standard would likely raise the cost of oil by less than a dime a gallon in 2026 and could – emphasis on could – increase oil costs by another 45 cents by 2035. A possibility, and that’s all it is, for an increase far lower than Scott’s beloved $4 a gallon.

Gee, that’s inconvenient. You mean the governor and his party have been blowing smoke about the Clean Heat Standard all along? Just for the sake of politics? Shocked, I am shocked.

Equallly shocked I am that the PUC manufactured, out of thin air and whole cloth, a substitute rationale for killing the CHS.

Continue reading →

Democrats Be Democrattin’

8 Replies

VTDigger’s post-Mearhoff political “team” has done itself proud in the early days of the new year, publishing not one, but two, articles outlining a fresh outbreak of an old familiar malady of the left — Democrats in Disarray.

Yeah, I’ve seen this movie before, over and over again. The Dems react to an electoral defeat by watering down their agenda and shifting (if not stampeding) to the center. When, in fact, the lesson to be learned from election victories on both sides is that voters reward authenticity — and are unconvinced by carefully titrated policy positions that have been focus-grouped to death. And by “authenticity” I mean everything from Jimmy Carter’s humble populism to Donald Trump’s extravagant disregard for political norms. (Trump may be a phony and a huckster but he’s consistent about it. He is, as he has told us repeatedly, that snake.)

Digger’s Emma Cotton brings us word of a panicky retreat from the Dems’ climate agenda, while the (at least for the moment) sole occupant of the political beat, Shaun Robinson, reports that quite a few House Democrats are prepared to defenestrate Speaker Jill Krowinski in favor of independent Rep. Laura Sibilia. Enough are against Krowinski or undecided that next week’s election for Speaker may be a close affair.

Both are clear and obvious overreactions to the results of the November elections, which saw many a Democrat go down to defeat — but which left the Democrats with a majority in the Senate and nearly a two-thirds majority in the House. To say that they “lost” the election is to avoid the fact that they still rule the Statehouse roost, and would be fully justified in pursuing an ambitious agenda in the new biennium. Even so, many Dems seem to be running scared. Some of their more influential member are, dare I say, sounding a lot like Phil Scott Republicans. And no, that’s not a compliment.

Continue reading →

Are You Ready For the Climate Culture Wars?

4 Replies

Welp, Gov. Phil Scott has revealed himself to be all hat and no cattle when it comes to climate action. As Seven Days’ Kevin McCallum reports, our alleged climate fightin’ leader is calling for a full retreat on, you know, doing anything about reducing greenhouse gas emissions. With the exception of furrowed brows and earnest expressions of concern. Per McCallum, here is Phil Scott’s climate agenda:

  • Kill the clean heat standard
  • Kill the Global Warming Solutions Act
  • Ignore our 2025 emissions reduction targets
  • Ignore our 2030 emissions reduction targets
  • Effectively put all our eggs in the 2050 basket

That’s one hell of a platform for a guy who claims to believe that climate change is a clear and present threat to humanity’s future.

His argument here, as on every other issue, is affordability. Vermont simply can’t afford to cut emissions or transition to a clean energy future.

A couple things about that. “Affordable” compared to what, exactly? His projections about the unaffordability of energy transition appear to rely on the assumption that fossil fuel prices won’t rise. Anyone who’s played Russian Roulette with the cost of propane or heating oil could testify otherwise.

Putting all his chips on affordability also ignores the impacts of climate change. As we have seen, Vermont is far from safe in this regard. In fact, we have one of the highest totals in the nation of federally-declared disasters since 2011. We don’t have beachfronts or flatlands, but we do have a rugged topography of mountains, hills, and deep valleys. The latter is where (a) most of our people live, and (b) the runoff easily overwhelms our rivers and streams when greenhouse gas-fueled downpours occur. We have yet to experience catastrophic wildfires around here, although the risk has been worryingly high for a good chunk of this year. Just a matter of time.

But Scott’s latest statements should come as no surprise. All he’s done is pull the sheep’s clothing off his inner wolf. In truth, he has been a resulote obstructor of serious climate action since he became governor. (Back in 2021, I called him the biggest obstacle to climate action in Vermont.) Kind of fitting for a guy who’s spent his entire adult life working with fossil fuel-powered machinery.

Continue reading →

Well, Here’s Another Thing — Or a Bunch of Things — Phil Scott Isn’t Doing

Leave a reply

If he didn’t have a decade-plus track record of ignoring the political implications of his work, I’d think Auditor Doug Hoffer pulled a nice little election-year fast one on Gov. Phil Scott. Yesterday, just in time for the beginning of campaign season, Hoffer issued a devastating report (downloadable here) on the state’s failure to implement its 2018 State Hazard Mitigation Plan.

Which can now be added to my extensive list of Stuff Phil Scott Hasn’t Done. Too bad the Democrats aren’t putting up an effective challenge to the governor’s bid for a fifth term. The Hoffer audit would make an effective cudgel.

The Mitigation Plan included 96 discrete actions to reduce the impacts of natural disasters. Hoffer found that only about one-third had been implemented. Even high-priority items were “frequently” unfinished. And this was a five-year plan that expired in 2023, so it’s not like the administration didn’t have all the time it should have needed. Meanwhile, we’ve been beset by disaster after disaster including major flooding in each of the last two summers. Hoffer told VTDigger that full implementation of the Plan “would have made a difference in the last two years.”

The audit was released a few hours after Scott’s weekly press conference, so reporters didn’t get the chance to quiz him about it. But it did lend a touch of retrospective irony to the presser, which began with Scott bragging about once again relaunching his tired old “Capital for a Day’ concept. Nice way to stage high-profile, media-friendly events in all 14 counties while On Official Business, eh?

Continue reading →