More Than $4 Billion against Wind Energy: Trump Is Fueling the Climate Crisis
The U.S. administration is paying billions for deals that will prevent wind energy projects. It is a disaster that the energy corporation RWE is going along with.
The effects of the climate crisis, which have already begun, are getting more obvious every day -- this summer, for instance, with especially extreme heat waves in both North American and Europe and with massive wild fires on both sides of the Atlantic. So, what could be more logical than actively preventing investments in carbon-neutral energy production?
That is exactly what Donald Trump’s administration is doing in the U.S. in an agreement with the German energy giant RWE, which is relinquishing wind energy projects in the U.S. and instead promising Trump that it will invest in fossil fuels — promising profits for itself. The deals that the Trump administration is making with energy companies like RWE to block wind farms is one of the most blatant examples of how it is actively working to destroy the world. The government in Washington has spent more than $4 billion on such agreements.
That is what free market economics looks like in Trump’s world, and that is how he thinks about his obligation to act for the good of the American people. While Trump is still actively denying that the climate crisis exists, other actors in his ideological orbit have meanwhile begun to admit that it does — and at the same time to declare that nothing more can be done about it and thus that climate protections should (continue to) be ignored. In doing so, those on the right are assuming, of course, that “the others” are the ones who are and will suffer from the climate catastrophe, previously people in other parts of the world, especially in the Global South, and now those in their own society who are less able to protect themselves from a world that is burning.
The fact that RWE and its American subsidiary are making a deal with Trump is sleazy — although one expects nothing less under capitalist conditions. Even if RWE has slightly moved its portfolio in the direction of renewable energy, the corporation continues to make massive investments in fossil fuels. It is hopelessly naive to expect that such businesses would voluntarily undertake a climate-friendly transformation as quickly as is necessary.
Instead, political will is needed to force this transformation before even greater damage is done than that which is already observable and inevitable. But such will is lacking not only in the U.S., but in many governments. Not least, Germany’s ruling coalition is ignoring the fact that Germany is falling short of its climate goals, and is turning the steering wheel in the wrong direction on this issue.
The effects of the climate crisis, which have already begun, are getting more obvious every day -- this summer, for instance, with especially extreme heat waves in both North American and Europe and with massive wild fires on both sides of the Atlantic. So, what could be more logical than actively preventing investments in carbon-neutral energy production?
That is exactly what Donald Trump’s administration is doing in the U.S. in an agreement with the German energy giant RWE, which is relinquishing wind energy projects in the U.S. and instead promising Trump that it will invest in fossil fuels — promising profits for itself. The deals that the Trump administration is making with energy companies like RWE to block wind farms is one of the most blatant examples of how it is actively working to destroy the world. The government in Washington has spent more than $4 billion on such agreements.
That is what free market economics looks like in Trump’s world, and that is how he thinks about his obligation to act for the good of the American people. While Trump is still actively denying that the climate crisis exists, other actors in his ideological orbit have meanwhile begun to admit that it does — and at the same time to declare that nothing more can be done about it and thus that climate protections should (continue to) be ignored. In doing so, those on the right are assuming, of course, that “the others” are the ones who are and will suffer from the climate catastrophe, previously people in other parts of the world, especially in the Global South, and now those in their own society who are less able to protect themselves from a world that is burning.
The fact that RWE and its American subsidiary are making a deal with Trump is sleazy — although one expects nothing less under capitalist conditions. Even if RWE has slightly moved its portfolio in the direction of renewable energy, the corporation continues to make massive investments in fossil fuels. It is hopelessly naive to expect that such businesses would voluntarily undertake a climate-friendly transformation as quickly as is necessary.
Instead, political will is needed to force this transformation before even greater damage is done than that which is already observable and inevitable. But such will is lacking not only in the U.S., but in many governments. Not least, Germany’s ruling coalition is ignoring the fact that Germany is falling short of its climate goals, and is turning the steering wheel in the wrong direction on this issue.
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