President Biden Asserts ‘Climate Change Is An Emergency’

President Joe Biden did not succumb to pressure from leading members of the Democratic Party to declare a national state of climate emergency in his remarks in Somerset, Massachusetts, this afternoon. Nevertheless, speaking at the site of the decommissioned coal-fired Brayton Point Power Station, Biden did assert that “climate change is an emergency” and “a clear and present danger” to the United States.

As evidence, Biden claimed that hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires, and droughts have been getting worse. He cited losses of $145 billion in weather damages from last year. He noted that 100 million Americans are currently under heat alerts. Citing these data, the president declared that “climate change is literally an existential threat.” He vowed to use his executive powers in the coming weeks to combat the threat of climate change.

Average temperatures in the contiguous United States have increased by about 2 degrees Fahrenheit since 1900. And unabated climate change could cause significant problems for humanity before the end of this century.

But are hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires, and droughts in the U.S. getting worse? University of Colorado climate change policy researcher Roger Pielke, Jr. notes that the number of landfalling hurricanes hitting the continental United States has been falling since 1900. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s latest report observes that the annual average number of tornadoes in the U.S. has remained constant sinc