As we eulogize President Jimmy Carter, we should recall his extraordinary leadership on climate change and renewable energy. While most writing has focused on his foreign policy accomplishments, The New York Times recalls Carter’s vision for renewable energy in America, which was represented symbolically by the installation of a solar water-heater on the White House and politically by robust solar research and development efforts within the Department of Energy (more details in a 2010 essay in Scientific American). Inside Climate News calls Carter “A Visionary.” In Rolling Stone, Jeff Goodell notes that Carter, who signed the first toxic-waste cleanup bill and the first fuel-economy legislation, has been called the greatest environmental President. “Carter himself never gave up the fight. When he was 92, he installed 3,852 solar panels on his land in Plains, Georgia, which create enough electricity to power half of the town.”

Even more importantly, at President Carter’s request, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) undertook a landmark analysis of global warming, which Carter had been studying before he was President. The NAS study, conducted under the leadership of Professor Jule Charney of MIT, famously concluded that if greenhouse-gas emissions continued there was “no reason to doubt that climate changes will result, and no reason to believe these changes will be negligible.” It also predicted we would see “Arctic amplification,” where climatic changes would occur more quickly in the Arctic due to the loss of reflective (e.g., cooling) ice and snow cover.

It is therefore no great surprise to science that The New York Times is reporting in 2024 on the great changes underway in the Arctic. Permafrost is thawing, sea ice is retreating, air temperatures are rising and wildfires are becoming more common and severe. These changes are threatening native populations and wildlife. Will it get worse? “Scientists can’t yet say that the changes being observed in the Arctic are irreversible, or that they are accelerating and compounding.” Thawing permafrost is causing land movements that are endangering native villages and industrial installations like the Trans-Alaskan Pipeline.

Most ominously, the thaw in the Arctic, along with the wildfires, are turning the region into a source of carbon emissions to the atmosphere. Minimal decomposition due to cold temperatures has allowed organic material to accumulate in Arctic soils, and so the region has historically sequestered carbon from the atmosphere. This is an example of how the planet is approaching tipping points, where subsequent climatic and ecologic changes occur independent of human action. The New York Times reports that “the period from October 2023 to September 2024 was the second-warmest for the region since 1900.” The Northwest Passage, the sea route that links the Atlantic and the Pacific through the islands of northern Canada, is becoming more and more ice-free each summer. This is changing geopolitics, especially for Canada as it seeks to protect the sovereignty of its northern lands.

As damage from extreme weather mounts, it is becoming clear that the climate crisis is fostering an insurance crisis, another outcome that was predicted. The Guardian notes that average premiums have increased substantially since 2020. For the U.S. counties in the top-fifth for climate-driven risk, home-insurance premiums increased by 22% from 2020-2023. Hardest hit is Florida, where home-insurance costs rose 42% in 2023. This is forcing homeowners to choose between insurance and mortgage payments, which is a no-win situation. It is estimated that 10% of American homeowners are now going without insurance, and nearly a third of losses from natural disasters are uninsured.

Many homeowners in California, including me, have received notices that their insurance companies will not be renewing the policies protecting their dwellings. The New York Times reports that, since 2018, more than 1.9 million homeowners have experienced “nonrenewal” of their insurance. The article states that “without insurance, you can’t get a mortgage; without a mortgage, most Americans can’t buy a home. Communities that are deemed too dangerous to insure face the risk of falling property values, which means less tax revenue for schools, police and other basic services.”

The Conversation notes that “it isn’t just that premiums are changing. Insurers now often reduce coverage limits, cap payouts, increase deductibles and impose new conditions or even exclusions on some common perils, such as protection for wind, hail or water damage. Some require certain preventive measures or apply risk-based pricing — charging more for homes in flood plains, wildfire-prone zones, or coastal areas at risk of hurricanes.” The head of re-insurance giant Swiss Re thinks that rates are still too low to cover expected losses, as many insurance companies are losing money and several have filed for bankruptcy. Reinsurance companies, the large firms that insure insurance companies, are raising their rates. Property reinsurance rates alone increased by 35% in 2023.

The New York Times notes that insurance companies are continuing to lose money across many states. A variety of factors in addition to climate change are contributing to this, including higher costs for reconstruction, reinsurance, fraud and litigation. But unlike those other factors, climate change doesn’t respond quickly to policy changes, nor is it cyclical. Disasters are going to keep getting worse. Inside Climate News examines the insurance situation in Colorado, where rates have risen 58% from 2018 to 2023. The Washington Post has some suggestions for obtaining insurance in this rapidly changing market. In a Volts podcast, Dave Roberts dives into the details of this “growing fustercluck.”

High interest rates and global supply-chain problems have slowed the development of offshore-wind power in the U.S. And now, a vocal critic of offshore-wind development has been elected U.S. President. Trump has said “wind farms harm property values and wildlife. More outlandishly, he has claimed wind energy causes cancer, increases food prices, and prevents people from watching TV when the wind isn’t blowing.” Trump’s ignorant bluster will run up against organized efforts to develop the industry by the states, particularly in New England, and now by industrial unions. Grist describes how the unions are working actively, often in partnership with states, to support and advance renewable-energy initiatives. A union leader stated “climate change, it’s not a theory. It’s an actual thing, it’s not a belief system, it’s an issue that we’re going to have to deal with.” Well, better late than never, I guess! Another article in Grist examines how careful listening and discussion can help bridge the divide that has many American conservatives adopting the radical position of rejecting climate science and renewable energy.

In Salon, Matthew Rozsa describes in disturbing detail the impact that the incoming Trump Administration’s denial of science will have on the environment and public health. Both direct and indirect politicization of scientific findings will slow our collective response to the impact of fossil fuels and toxins such as PFAS. Rozsa does a great job capturing the reality of how government scientists operate to protect the public, and the various ways Trump and his appointees will work to make their jobs as difficult as possible.

Salon quotes Peter Kalmus, a climate scientist at NASA (who clarifies he’s speaking for himself), with a perspective on the impacts of Trump and his cronies: “Everything is getting worse, fast — and instead of stopping it, the billionaire class has the pedal to the floor. This will set the stage for reduced habitability on our planet for an extremely long time. Biodiversity could take millions of years to recover. It could lead to billions of human deaths, unimaginable suffering, and limit the possibilities for our species far into the future.”

Grist visits Gainesville, Florida, where local efforts to address climate-change impacts are being stymied by the state government. City policies for the reduction of single-use plastic, improving energy-efficiency standards in homes, ending restrictive zoning and increasing the number of EV charging stations have all been “pre-empted” by state law that disallows these efforts. The state actually passed a specific law to take over the local utility (Gainesville Regional Utilities) when it began to take actions to address climate change. Florida has recently removed the mention of climate change from state laws and school textbooks. This is sad, infuriating and, in the end, very dangerous to Florida’s citizens.

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