more drought, more floods, more poverty, acceleration of species extinction and more warfare as a result of fighting over reduced resources vote for Hillary.

a lot more expensive which could lead to large losses of affordable housing.

and not caring what direction she wants to drive the nation.

No nukes, certainly.

So.... no power whatsoever?

sources will take their place, however Hillary would prefer to play Russian Roulette and keep us addicted to the game.

Sustainable energy sources that don't contribute to the destruction of human society are the greatest power of all.

faster under Bernie than Hillary.

We'll need to get those fossil fuels from somewhere, and I'm assuming you'd prefer to use the cleanest energy available. So, no coal. Petroleum is also filthy. Natural gas is the most efficient in terms of production and energy yield, lowest carbon emissions, no waste, and incredible abundance. Or... what?

releasing massive amounts of methane; which is an even greater heat trapping gas than carbon dioxide.

There is nothing clean about it.

If we stop fracking (for both gas and oil), we start importing 50% of our energy again, and energy prices will at least double.

Do I have this right? This is the plan?

replace our addiction to environmental and societal destroying fossil fuels.

Breaking an addiction is rarely easy but prolonging it serves no good purpose and can lead to an early death.

I will say that if I were the Energy Czar for this country, highly regulated and monitored fracking of natural gas and petroleum would be my centerpiece. No deep well injection of waste with no exceptions (earthquakes in OK drop back to baseline). Coal continues to fizzle out. Nuclear remains on the back burner until they figure out the waste issue.

Transitioning to renewables is the second pillar of the plan. Fewer subsidies, but not zero.

fracking only serves to prolong our and the rest of the world's addiction to fossil fuels.

When fuel prices were higher more efficient cars were being developed as gas prices dropped SUVs started coming back into vogue, the same thing happened in 70s with the oil embargo as more people started driving smaller cars when gas prices dropped we went back to larger automobiles.

And, this: The fossil fuel industry will be phased out, solar, wind, geothermal and other sustainable energy sources will take their place, however Hillary would prefer to play Russian Roulette and keep us addicted to the game.

Sustainable energy sources that don't contribute to the destruction of human society are the greatest power of all.

Hopefully, much sooner than later. This planet cannot wait.

There is no reason for resistance to it any more, and whomever is elected needs to push this through. Period. We can't pander to people or play games any more.

There are many options for bio and for waste burning to create power. There will never be an end to manure and waste in this country.

There are probably many more methods of generating power that I'm not even thinking of.

Every bus, car and train (and ships) should have solar built into it.

Our planet is dying.

If they don't extract it, they won't profit from it.

For the price of the Second Iraq War, we could have built a 100-percent renewable national energy grid.

Thank you for an outstanding OP, Uncle Joe.

It's up to local communities, it must not affect groundwater, and the fracking chemicals must be divulged.

But the reason Obama (and Hilary) are for fracking have little to do with climate change, and a lot to do with energy independence. One of the reasons our economy has recovered so nicely compared with the rest of the western world is that fracking has allowed us to keep energy costs down.

There are trade-offs in everything.

What I don't get about Bernie is that he's against everything including nuclear energy. Most climate scientists favor nuclear energy as a short term clean energy solution while better alternatives are being developed. Bernie, rather than supporting the scientists, support the environmentalists. I don't see how Bernie's climate change plans actually get implemented. How does he take away so many sources of energy without having things to replace it with? Most renewable energy sources are still being developed and are still quite expensive.

warmest year ever already

Consider Bernie wants to fuck up international trade, I doubt he's going to get a lot of buy in from the international community. It's a lot more complicated than Bernie's simple prescriptions, but hey simple gets votes -- Reagan understood that, and so does Bernie. Maybe it's the wisdom that comes with age?

the development of sustainable energy sources.

"Energy Independence" means nothing if we destroy the environment in the process.

If you're a heroin addict and the price of heroin goes down is that a good thing?

That bill invested billions in the development of sustainable energy sources. There is a lot going on in the US in this regard thanks to Obama and the Democrats. It's because the economy is improving that people are able to invest in alternative energy sources. My sister installed solar panels on her house a couple years ago. The cost was $40k, but with various government incentives, the cost fell to $11k, and if they generates excess energy, the electric company buys it back from him. But, thanks to Obama there is a lot going on with sustainable energy.

... and like it or not Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Foundation have at least some connection with critical players just about everywhere. I'm not sure Bernie will be as effective at negotiating with dictators and despots as will Hillary. But, whatever negotiation takes place, if you think that free trade won't figure in, I think you're wrong. Bernie's plans are simple, but I don't think they are realistic. No country is going to support our efforts on global warming if we're also doing what we can to close off our markets. There are no easy solutions.

negotiating skills with dictators, despots nor democratically elected leaders.

Other nations have their own self-evident vital interests in regards to the issue of cooperating on the global warming climate change issue, indeed a fair number of them are ahead of us.

She did not attempt to generate glory for herself, and basically worked to heal some of the anger created during the Bush years. She largely calmed things down and earned the US a lot of good will. I think she did a really good job, and was not narcissistic about it. I also think if Gore was president, he would probably have a fairly similar approach to that of Hillary and Obama -- negotiate on a variety of matters with the world to secure gains in climate change. I don't think Bernie has anything to negotiate with considering his stands on free trade, American involvement overseas, and protecting American jobs first. I just think it's an awfully complicated situation.

Whatever Obama and Hillary's geopolitical calculations were around that issue remain to be discovered, but I suppose when Bernie voted to topple Saddam in 1999, voted for war appropriations in 2001, and so much supported the Kosovo war that he had protesters arrested, he too had his geopolitical calculations.

At any rate, after the primary season, I hope you involve yourself in helping the Hondurans, lest it appear that you are simply exploiting them for political ends.

he wasn't going to abandon funding them.

There is nothing "sudden" about my concern for overthrowing democratically elected leaders whether it be in Honduras or anywhere else.

... he was considered effective. One can respect effective people. I think Bernie respects Jim Inhofe, the leading climate denier in the Senate, for instance.

Bernie just stated that Inhofe was personally likable but he didn't agree with his stance on the issues.

Kissinger was an effective war criminal.

 To the extent our leaders have cared about climate change, they’ve fixed on CO2. Partly as a result, coal-fired power plants have begun to close across the country. They’ve been replaced mostly with ones that burn natural gas, which is primarily composed of methane. Because burning natural gas releases significantly less carbon dioxide than burning coal, CO2 emissions have begun to trend slowly downward, allowing politicians to take a bow. But this new Harvard data, which comes on the heels of other aerial surveys showing big methane leakage, suggests that our new natural-gas infrastructure has been bleeding methane into the atmosphere in record quantities. And molecule for molecule, this unburned methane is much, much more efficient at trapping heat than carbon dioxide.

(snip)

The Obama administration, to its credit, seems to be waking up to the problem. Over the winter, the EPA began to revise its methane calculations, and in early March, the United States reached an agreement with Canada to begin the arduous task of stanching some of the leaks from all that new gas infrastructure. But none of this gets to the core problem, which is the rapid spread of fracking. Carbon dioxide is driving the great warming of the planet, but CO2 isn’t doing it alone. It’s time to take methane seriously.

It's a hard line to accept. We all want our gas prices to go down and many of us can't afford a new electric car. So when prices go down, we are happy, even if it means it's not good for the cause. So we need to be diligent and fight for what is right, even at the cost of our gas prices going up.

This of course hits the poor the hardest. Something that Bernie should work on is a cheaper electric car model with tax incentives or even for those too poor to pay income taxes, some kind of monetary incentive to buy an electric car.

I'd love to have a Tesla, but even the new cheaper version is so far beyond my means...I'll never have one.


Good topic Joe.

to sustainable energy sources, including subsidizing efficient vehicles, I believe it would go a long way in a positive direction.

Thank you, passiveporcupine.