U.S. President Joe Biden speaks during the Fourth Major Economies Forum (MEF) leadership video conference on Energy and Climate at the South Court Auditorium next to the White House in Washington, DC, April 20, 2023. (Photo by Jim WATSON/AFP) (Photo by JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images)
Jim Watson | afp | beautiful pictures
Chairperson Joe Biden The White House said on Friday it would sign an executive order directing federal agencies to invest in disadvantaged communities heavily impacted by pollution and climate change.
The order would create a new Office of Environmental Justice in the White House to coordinate all environmental justice efforts across the federal government and require agencies to notify nearby communities if substances hazardous discharge from a federal facility.
President, who is preparing to announce re-election next week, will make the announcement during a ceremony in the White House Rose Garden. A White House official said he is also expected to condemn Republicans for “protecting grants to Big Oil companies” and “fighting to make it easier for oil and gas companies to pollute.” the air we breathe”.
Biden is expected to argue that his administration’s historic climate and environmental justice agenda contrasts with the “dangerous vision that Speaker McCarthy and his radical caucuses It’s for our planet, economy and public health,” the official said.
Republican lawmakers have called for tighter regulation of oil production to lower energy prices. And earlier this week, Speaker Kevin McCarthy proposed raising the one-year debt limit and reducing federal spending, including repealing electric vehicles and other clean energy tax incentives under the Inflation Reduction Act.
Early in his presidency, Biden pledged that addressing environmental justice would be a core component of his climate agenda. and sign an executive order launched the Justice40 Initiative, which requires agencies to deliver at least 40% of the return on investments to underburdened communities.
Communities of color across the United States face systematically higher levels of air pollution than white communities due to federal housing discrimination, Base on the research published in the journal Environmental Science and Technology. Black Americans are 75% more likely to live near hazardous waste production facilities than white Americans, based on clean air task force, and are three times more likely to die from exposure to air pollutants.
“For too long, communities across our country have faced persistent environmental injustices caused by toxic pollution, a lack of investment in critical infrastructure and services, and such as the unusual disproportionate environmental harm resulting from the legacy of racism including redefining boundaries,” the White House said in a statement. “These communities with an environmental justice concern face an even greater burden from climate change.”
Beverly Wright, founder and executive director of the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice, said in a statement that while Biden’s executive order is historic, “much work remains to be done to achieve it. get real environmental justice.”
President previously set The Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights – comprised of more than 200 EPA employees in 10 US regions – is overseeing the delivery of a $3 billion climate and environmental justice block grant program. dollars created by the Inflation Mitigation Act. The bill includes $60 billion for environmental justice initiatives.
