Op-Ed: We Need Climate Action Now

By Kat Lane

People across California are coming together on April 8th to demand our governor, Gavin Newsom, take action and ban all new fossil fuel extraction permits.

Climate stewards have much to thank Governor Newsom for, but we need to go further. Over the last several years, community groups throughout the state have come together by the dozens to oppose specific local fossil fuel projects in their communities. This has proven a relatively effective strategy, but we simply cannot win them all.

Time and time again, as soon as we successfully stop one dangerous project from getting permitted, another one pops up just around the corner. We need action at the state level to relieve the burden of local groups opposing destructive projects in a “whack-a-mole” style, so that we can stop pouring more and more greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere and start collectively focusing on solutions and ways to move forward into a greener future.

The most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report is the most dire one we have seen – warning us that greenhouse gas emissions must peak by 2025 and be halved by 2030 if we have any hope of limiting global heating by 1.5 C. Any more warming and there will be significant irreversible impacts to food supply, fresh water sources, significant increases in wildfires and other natural disasters, and loss of biodiversity which leads to diseases and pandemics.

The report goes on to say that to achieve these goals, all sectors of the global economy will have to change drastically and rapidly. From what we eat, wear, how we get from one place to another, and most importantly, where we get our energy. The time of fossil fuels has come to an end. The time for “phasing out” has passed.

We are in a climate emergency, as declared by our own Board of Supervisors over 2 years ago in December of 2019. Still no substantial actions have been taken. Santa Barbara County’s own Climate Action Plan report shows that we are not on track to meet the goals we set for ourselves in 2015, and in several areas greenhouse gas emissions have actually increased.

I will be attending the rally outside of the County Administration building on April 8th at noon to show Gavin Newsom that we need a ban on new fossil fuel projects at the state level. I hope to see you there. 


Op-Ed’s are written by community members. The views and opinions expressed in Op-Ed articles are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of edhat. Do you have an opinion on something local? Share it with us at ed@edhat.com.

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  1. It’s really sad the right frowns on education. We could use so many more engineers right now. The next 20 years and beyond will be a booming job market for young people to solve complex problems – rather than count on their fingers 1=No 2=Bad like some of their misguided parents.

  2. GT – My friend you are right, we do need more engineers! Not sure what that has to do with this misguided article that 1) somehow thinks ending Oil usage is possible right now, and even more spectacularly 2) thinks it actually makes sense right now considering current world events. But, back to your random off topic point: you are right…more engineers are needed!!!

  3. Natural gas is one of the cleanest of fossil fuels and the US has the largest natural gas reserves in the entire world. If we allowed further development of this resource, both its extraction and its transportation to liquifying facilities, we could be selling this energy source all over the world where other countries would be able to switch from much dirtier energy sources, like coal, providing a real and significant reduction to green house gas emissions. The benefits would be the equivalent of swapping out all cars in the US with electric vehicles. Not to mention the added benefits of other countries relying on the US for it’s energy rather than countries like Iran, Russia, etc. as well as the economic benefits and job creating it would provide here at home. “Since 2010, coal-to-gas switching has saved around 500 million tonnes of CO2 – an effect equivalent to putting an extra 200 million EVs running on zero-carbon electricity on the road over the same period.” https://www.iea.org/reports/the-role-of-gas-in-todays-energy-transitions

  4. GeneralTree: We cannot live in the past. History is important, but you also need to look to today and the future. To be so focused and stuck on the former POTUS is so yesterday, and has no bearing on anything except to those who cannot move ahead. I’m sure that your time is valuable, so use that time wisely for positive measures, and not, N-O-T spend your waking hours constantly in fear or afraid of a one-term disgraced President.

  5. VOR – endless articles and conservative news segments hating on academia and college in general. Yeah – the right is against higher education most definitely thanks in part to far right nativism populism.

  6. Do you know how many people would be driven to poverty, famine, and death if we just stopped oil production all of sudden? Yet the ones calling for a common sense path towards a carbon free future are the “scum”…

  7. Most of the fertilizer used around the world is derived from natural gas. We would not be able to feed Earth’s population with out it. How many people are we going to be okay with starving to death in name of shutting off fossil fuels?

  8. Because public education is working out so well in left-controlled CA? https://edsource.org/2022/student-math-scores-a-five-alarm-fire-in-california/669797
    Education, public education, and private education are three sperate things. Always one for buzzwords and propaganda, GT throws out BS like the right frowns on education and you just nod in agreement because of course, everything the left is for is good, and everything the right is for is bad. So easy when you look at it that way.

  9. Just a few sources, take them as you will:
    1. Blue States More Educated than Red States
    https://time.com/101697/blue-states-barack-obama-won-in-2012-are-more-educated-than-red-states/
    2. Most Educated States in 2022
    https://wallethub.com/edu/e/most-educated-states/31075
    3. Most Educated States Voted Blue
    https://medium.com/@kathrynstaublin/the-most-educated-states-voted-blue-f60f304531f7

  10. “Because public education is working out so well in left-controlled CA?” – whataboutism at its finest lol! I’m not getting into another tit for tat thing here, but couldn’t let that lazy attempt get past me…. and done.

  11. Never said I was talking about only people here…. stop “putting words in other peoples mouths and making assumptions that simply aren’t true.”
    Also, Chip. Yeah, you apparently overlooked his ill informed rant against renewables at 12:49……

  12. Yes babycakes – great argument – you only point out flaws on one side of the aisle. I’ve never feared buffoons by the way – so thank you but you don’t need to psycho analyze my mornings. And I am looking at the “today.” This year is a current event and overturning the edict to drill in the arctic was an important one.

  13. VOR I was responding to someone other than you – so not sure how you involved yourself. And solving todays problems is not off-topic and relates to the discussion. But I agree with you more engineers!

  14. The right has become a jumble of anti-academia, anti-learning, anti-higher education nativist populists.
    https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2019/08/19/the-growing-partisan-divide-in-views-of-higher-education-2/
    “The share of Americans saying colleges and universities have a negative effect has increased by 12 percentage points since 2012. The increase in negative views has come almost entirely from Republicans and independents who lean Republican. From 2015 to 2019, the share saying colleges have a negative effect on the country went from 37% to 59% among this group. Over that same period, the views of Democrats and independents who lean Democratic have remained largely stable and overwhelmingly positive.”

  15. Sacjon
    I’m quoting an article here, but this somewhat sums it up. I’m not anti-oil either – I just know the status quo isn’t going to work for future generations.
    “It is abetted by Republican state and federal legislators that are being duped and lobbied with misinformation on renewables. It is catalyzed by contributions for reelection campaigns by these same special interests. It is coordinated by a network of conservative think tanks. Unfortunately, the public is largely unaware of this, and we will all pay an extreme price. America is for sale.”

  16. Green energy is great! And in conjunction with a lot of oil production good things are possible! We can’t limit oil at this point AND we must Pursue green. The people who completely shun solar and the people that want to end oil immediately are truly and completely divorced from reality….

  17. Houston, we’ve got a problem. Several weeks back Jen Psaki said: “There are 9,000 approved oil leases that oil companies are not tapping into currently.” Basically, this is saying that our current administration is A-OK with drilling/extracting on those 9,000 leases. That’s insane!
    Some suggestions to combat climate change:
    – Give up your car if it uses gasoline to power its motor. However, be prepared to have down time while your car charges. Maybe you’ve seen the Teslas lined up at Five Points waiting to get a chance to connect to a charger to fill up on electric juice. Craziness for sure.
    – Reduce your reliance on petroleum-based products (for clothing, think cotton or some other plant fiber). This is difficult, but if you’re serious about change, then change starts at home…and that means you, you, and y’all.
    – Start using the local MTD to get around…..at a minimum, buy a bus pass or two to support our public transportation system.
    – Walk to the store if feasible.
    – Get yourself an e-bike and put a basket on the front and/or back.
    – Stop ordering things from Amazon. My neighbor told me that she put in an Amazon order for hair clips, marking pens, 6-pack wool socks, laundry detergent, and some nuts. That order was broken down to three orders, which, in turn, required THREEEEEEE different truck deliveries!
    – Start raising awareness about India and China to get them on board with the climate-change crisis (they seem to have missed memos #1 through #infinity).
    – Don’t get mad when someone does not believe in climate change. Calling them morons, idiots, simpletons, A-hol3s, and so on only makes y-o-u look bad.
    – Stop the madness about coming across as being superior if you actually know more than the average person about climate change. Some people are more worried about putting food on the table and not worried about the endangered field flea (or long-tailed chirping chirper, ground grub, etc.) that seem to be found on oil-producing properties.
    Lastly, continue the good work!

  18. Our public shools are not producing enough engineers, so we are importing them at the public university level from other countries.
    Public schools in NYC do stupid things like limiting Asian % in their stem classes because they tend to achieve higher scores. That’s not right wing stupidity.
    Diablo Cyn. accounts for 10% of CA electricity. It will probably be taken offline soon. Hydroelectric is at 10% and is dropping due to low water levels. NG accounts for about 50% of CA electricity
    Wind and solar require battery storage. Most people do not know that battery storage is very inefficient.
    Battery storage cannot be ramped up to meet peaks in demand like NG plants can, but batteries in sufficient quantities can provide a buffer for 3-4 hours.
    “Lithium-ion battery storage can already beat gas peaking plants on costs for up to two or three hours of daily power balancing,” BloombergNEF associate Tifenn Brandily said in an interview. But battery technology is not there beyond that time frame, Brandily said.
    Flow batteries, a new entrant into the storage market, are one possible option. The technology harnesses electrochemical energy generated by flowing chemicals dissolved in liquid across separate sides of a central membrane. Flow batteries offer the advantage of a long-cycle life and long operational lifetime, but they have yet to compete effectively with lithium-ion technology’s low and rapidly falling cost.
    In the utility-scale energy storage market, seasonal and even just diurnal power-balancing solutions need to be developed to meet low-carbon energy targets in a cost-effective way, according to Brandily. “Until then, flexible gas-fired power will have a key role to play,” Brandily said.”
    https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/news-insights/latest-news-headlines/natural-gas-in-transition-grid-balancing-tactics-in-flux-as-battery-costs-fall-64822077

  19. Even though we are moving to EV’s, we still need gasoline powered transportation. If Newsom waved a magic wand and turned all the oil byproduct vehicles on the road right now to electricity, the electrical grid would crash. Wind and solar are never going to provide enough energy to meet demand. The solution? Nuclear powered energy production using 2022 technology.
    But no, we’ll try to do the impossible rather than be pragmatic

  20. 100%! To many see the utopian carbon-free dream in the future but are unable to layout a practical path to get there. What the op-ed is proposing is simply environmental NIMBYism, ban fossil fuel extraction here while still consuming large quantities of it locally. Instead they should be pushing for increased green power generation and distribution so that we have an abundant alternative energy source to wean ourselves off of fossil fuels. We have no choice to “phase out” because we don’t have an alternatives ready for a hard switch.

  21. You should read how important Russian fuel is to the economies of the EU, particularly Green Germany.
    Its not just for heat or driving cars around… it’s everything from metals to computer chips.
    Putin is exploiting EU green energy milestones that were being smoothed out by Russian fuels.
    Without those fuels Gemany’s economy sputters, hundreds of thousand of people have jobs directly related to fuel may lose them and as the richest nation, it drags the rest down.
    Don’t know if anyone noticed but Germany, Northern Europe can be a bit gray for solar, so can Northern France, which is why the French use nuclear. No one has figured out how to harness energy from 5 months of dreary weather
    Germany will act in its self interest and that interest is on Putin’s fuels flowing. That means Ukraine is SOL if it can’t win in a month
    Russia is also going to be able to grow its own food this year, helped along by its fossil fuel fertilizer production. Ukraine’s 2022 wheat production is very much in doubt and there will be food shortages and price hikes.
    Watch for western nations to try to force Ukraine to take a bad deal from Putin if the war doesn’t end by the end of April

  22. Help support Putin and his invasion of Ukraine! Encourage your elected representatives to reduce oil and natural gas as much as possible. In addition, shutting down oil and gas pipelines is another great way to do your pet for Putin. T These actions increase oil and gas prices which provides crucial financial support to Putin’s government. In addition, reducing the availability of domestic oil and gas helps increase dependence on Russia for the US and its allies. This gives Putin tremendous leverage by giving him the ability to shut off crucial supplies of energy which would result in economic disaster for Europe. So yes, do your pet and help support Putin by shutting down our domestic oil and gas production.

  23. In life, it’s all about timing. And your timing Ms Lane is almost comically bad! Right now we need to be pumping like crazy. We certainly need more green energy, but we are a critical juncture whereby we need to increase our oil production significantly!

  24. I’ll try to use a concept you’ll understand, no worries. Repeal and replace. We need to repeal oil and gas production and simultaneously replace it with renewable and clean energy that doesn’t make the world a sauna. It’s a silly strawman fallacy to say anyone wants to shut down fossil fuels without a realistic replacement. Maybe if the retired gameshow host had gotten military aid to Ukraine sooner instead of withholding it to make Zelenskyy do a corrupt pre-election political investigation of Biden based on nonexistent evidence, the Ukrainians would be in a better position.

  25. Repeal and replace??? How would you possibly do that…and how could you possibly even consider that with what is happening in Ukraine. And yes, Trump was horrible and a few hundred million dollars worth of military equipment a few months earlier would have been nice…but obviously not needle moving. The truth is we need more green energy and more oil production. That much is obvious and clear.

  26. DUKE – “The truth is we need more green energy and more oil production.” I agree, but let’s tweak that to “more green energy THAN oil production.” Sure, we will need to rely on oil as we phase into renewable energy, but let’s focus on getting “green” as soon as possible. Bummer is, there’s so much hatred and propaganda against renewables, it’s making it difficult to move forward. Look at any article on Facebook about the Lompoc wind farm and you’ll see what I mean. People are all about drill, baby, drill, but want nothing to do with the “cancer causing” wind turbines. We need to stop this Republican-backed propaganda war on wind and spread the truth. We need to get green asap, but it’s not easy with such a large anti-renewable lobby calling the shots!

  27. Sac – We need more green and more oil production… which is at odds with the writer of this op-ed. It’s crazy to think that this person is going to demand to end oil right now…as it’s completely divorced from current events and reality. This isn’t an either/or situation…it’s a BOTH somewhat maximized right now and for the foreseeable future. As I’ve pointed out countless times it’s the fringes that make insane points that are completely at odds with logic and reality. We need to embrace green energy…but at the same time (right now) we absolutely need to DRILL BABY DRILL!!

  28. Wind and solar power are not viable energy sources. At best, they can provide a small percentage of the energy we need part of the time. Its also important to take the CO2 blinders off and look at all the other forms of pollution. Lots of people like batteries, but give little thought to the environmental devastation caused their manufacture such as uranium contamination in the Congo from cobalt mining. Finally, outsourcing the production of our oil, gas, and other products to countries like China and Russia causes more pollution, not less. China is building coal fired power plants like it’s going out of style, and they are a lot more cavalier about how they dispose of industrial waste than we are. Therefore, the way to achieve the greatest and most immediate environmental benefit is to enact tariffs on all goods imported from countries like China to take away the competitive advantage they obtain by having environmental and labor standards that are far less than ours. At the same time, we need to produce our own energy and manufacture our own goods because we do it in a more environmentally responsible way than countries like China and it is strategically important to be self sufficient when dealing with the likes of Russia and China. Shutting down our domestic energy production weakens is relative to our adversaries like Putin and increases our environmental footprint.

  29. No thinking person does not want to rid us of our dependence on fossile fuels.
    The question is how this goal can be achieved. At present only 2% of all cars sold in the USA are ELV and most of those are in California. ELV’s depend upon fossile fuel for electic charging. The other issue is that most tax savings incentives for buying an ELV are for people in the higher income brackets, coupled with the fact that ELV’s are more expensive to buy than gasoline powered cars. Solar for homes works the same way. It’s costly to buy or lease and the tax savings benifits favor higher income brackets. Our entire system of fostering the phasing out of fossile fuels is upside down and benefits far too few people who want to take part. As to drilling for oil: Today Germany is sending arms to help Ulraine fight Russia, while at the same time sending billions of dollars to Putin that finace his madness for conquest! The USA is essentially self depndent for fossile fuels and until we solve the problem of fossile fuels vs. the better alternatives that can take over from their use, we need to keep drilling! I do not want to depend on other countries for our fuel needs and our very existance.

  30. There is no need for our country to continue to rely on fossil fuels. It will be less costly in the long run to rapidly transition away from them now. Some short-term pain for long-term gain. Not something Americans are good at, unfortunately.

  31. 113pm – You aren’t much for current events are you? There is an absolute and desperate need right now for our country to have and produce more fossil fuels. There is no option to rapidly move away from them. We can and need to increase green energy options, but at this juncture in time…we are a solid decade away from being able to transition away from oil. We need oil and green energy options. It’s truly baffling how some people can honestly think it’s an “either/or” at this point…

  32. Haha @Edney. The last guy was the most incoherent and unfit president we’ve seen. The current one needs glasses and has a speech impediment, and he’s old but he’s more mentally sound than the other old guy. Right wing media is doing a great job of perpetuating your theory though by editing video footage.

  33. If you actually want a carbon free future sooner rather than later, nuclear is the answer. If you don’t want nuclear then you need to be willing to wait longer for that carbon free future while we continue to use oil. If you believe a climate apocalypse is upon us that will jeopardize the future of humanity, then you should embrace nuclear ASAP, because even the worst nuclear accidents in history were minor and not even a blip on the radar compared to the climate armageddon you’re claiming will occur. If you want oil gone yesterday and won’t support nuclear, then you’re simply not living in reality. This comment section reeks of virtue but not a single actionable plan on how our society would operate tomorrow, or next year, or in 2025 without fossil fuels. The rational ones who’ve laid out ideas to phase out of fossil fuels without destroying society, the ones who proposed significantly safer, less polluting, though not perfect options like nuclear, are labeled “right-wing ollie conspiracy theorists” who don’t give an F about the environment. You many not realize it but your irrationality in the approach to this topic actually hinders the achievement of your goal.

  34. Big Carbon knows that fission technology is hugely expensive, very slow to come online, and dangerous in the long term, so pitching it is part of their strategy to extend their profits. No surprise there. Carbon-free, non-fission, is the only rational way forward.

  35. Too many people don’t have any concept of world event or reality. Green energy is great. We definitely must keep investing and expanding it…. But we aren’t anywhere near even contemplating slowing down oil extraction…we need to ramp up, ASAP!

  36. GeneralTree: As a life coach and emotional healer, I tend to pick up on things that most folks do not. Not sure why, but I suppose we’re all born to do something. You are correct that I was interpreting your comments (although, I would not call it psychoanalyzing) and noted anger focused on one person over and over again. We all have a right to do and say what we want for sure, but possibly an area that indicates something else. At the next prayer meeting I will have the group send orations to you and your family. I didn’t used to believe in the power of prayer until it happened to me….wow, did that change my life.

  37. Amazing. Imagine the hubris one fosters to think their “prayers” are needed, wanted or even still, effective. Keep thinking you’re special BC. Obviously it’s working out well for you…

  38. The right’s deep seeded lust for carbon is abetted by Republican state and federal legislators that are being duped and lobbied with misinformation on renewables. It is catalyzed by contributions for reelection campaigns by these same special interests. It is coordinated by a network of conservative think tanks. Unfortunately, the public is largely unaware of this, and we will all pay an extreme price. America is for sale.

  39. Misguided activism. We can hurt our society with all these feel-good limitations and it won’t have much impact on Climate Change (which has been changing since the planet was formed). Instead of blindly parroting the pronouncements of a few activists who misquote actual scientists perhaps we should all take the time to read the actual reports about what is happening. After all, if Nobel Prize inner Al Gore was correct over a decade ago, much of Santa Barbara would be under water by now now.

  40. Must be hard to be a male, caucasian, middle-aged Christian conservative in the USA these days. Everywhere you go you’re met with disdain and distrust, prejudice and violations of your Hippo rights! The pain is real! But don’t worry VOR, you can start your own site and be free from the oppressive Leftists and their radical socialism that is indoctrinating the American youth. I am sure it (like every other conservative minded digital media outlet) will do great! EdTruth.com is available. All you need to do is pick yourself up by the bootstraps and build it! I am sure it will do as well as TruthSocial and Lindell.TV Both of which are bastions of freeze peach and there’s not a mention of CTR (sic per Herschel Walker) in sight!

  41. Meanwhile President Biden’s teleprompter looks as big one of those signs Caltrans hangs on overpasses to tell you traffic conditions and he still loses his train of thought.
    If one does not think that was a piece of Putin’s plan, it is probably due to idealogy trumping common sense

  42. VOICE – what “censorship” are you crying about now? There’s no deleted comments here, not yet at least. You do realize though, that complain about deletions, up/down votes, the Edhat policies, etc, like you’re doing right now are violations of the TOS. ALL of your deleted comments, see the Deltopia article, are such because they’re OFF TOPIC. My problem is, I respond and then we go back and forth, off topic, and both getting deleted. I’ll probably get deleted for this one, since it’s in response to a “violating” comment, but I just wanted to make sure you know why you’re being put in the penalty box, which is hardly “censorship.” Cry me a river.

  43. The Exxon Corporation had agreed to plead guilty to a criminal charge arising from the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill and pay a $100 million fine. The Exxon Valdez disaster killed an estimated 250,000 sea birds, 3,000 otters, 300 seals, 250 bald eagles and 22 killer whales.

  44. 10:33 – Yes, but that’s because they were aware of the problem and took to preventative measures. Windmills do kill birds sometimes, but FAR less than oil production does.
    “Oil pits kill 500,000 to 1 million birds each year, according to a Fish and Wildlife Service estimate. That’s at least twice as many birds as wind turbines.” https://www.businessinsider.com/cats-kill-more-birds-than-wind-turbines-despite-trumps-claims-2020-10#:~:text=Nearly%20600%20million%20US%20birds,many%20birds%20as%20wind%20turbines.
    “Wind: Between 140,000 and 328,000 birds a year in the contiguous United States, according to a December 2013 study published in the journal Biological Conservation. Taller turbines tend to take out more birds.
    Oil and Gas: An estimated 500,000 to 1 million birds a year are killed in oil fields, the Bureau of Land Management said in a December 2012 memo.” https://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2014/08/22/pecking-order-energys-toll-on-birds

  45. Bloomberg currently has Russia on pace for 321 billion earned from energy exports this year (up from 240 billion in 2021). So sure Kat, end US oil production. We can then keep running to Iran, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela every time Russian atrocities make the news/make us feel bad and beg them to ramp up oil production. Great plan!!!!
    https://finance.yahoo.com/news/mocked-rubble-biden-russia-ruble-193615066.html

  46. What you’re failing to account for SACJON is currently wind produces a little less than 10% of our energy while fossil fuels produce 60%. Oil/gas may kill more birds now when it’s producing 6x more of our energy than wind, can you extrapolate what will happen to the bird deaths from oil vs. wind if 60% if our energy was produced from wind instead?

  47. VOICE – I did miss a good point, only because I was only responding to the 10:33am comment about birds and didn’t want to follow you off topic. Ever consider how many human beings are killed each year from the pollution caused by oil and gas production? How many you think are killed by windfarm pollution? Here’s a little help:
    https://www.seas.harvard.edu/news/2021/02/deaths-fossil-fuel-emissions-higher-previously-thought
    https://source.wustl.edu/2021/06/new-research-finds-1m-deaths-in-2017-attributable-to-fossil-fuel-combustion/#:~:text=They%20found%20that%20worldwide%2C%20more,in%20the%20journal%20Nature%20Communications.

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