US president, Joe Biden has announced a raft of measures that will help Americans face the “existential threat of climate change” and extreme heat.
“We want the American people to know help is here, and we’re gonna make it available to anyone who needs it,” the president said while speaking in a summer of record-breaking temperatures in the US and globally.
Biden was quoted as saying that the new measures will shield workers from high temperatures, improve weather forecasting, strengthen access to drinking water and otherwise improve heat resilience.
Experts have described the measures as positive but modest, and the president stopped short of declaring a climate emergency or directly addressing the need to phase out planet-heating fossil fuels.
Biden has also directed the Department of Labor to issue a hazard alert for workplaces such as farms and construction sites, where workers face a higher risk amid high temperatures.
According to reports, heat has killed 436 workers since 2011, according to federal statistics. Sectors including agriculture and construction also frequently see heat-related safety violations, so the labor department will also increase its inspections of high-risk workplaces, Biden said. He also took a veiled swipe at Greg Abbott, the Texas governor, who this year banned his state’s municipalities from requiring workers be offered water breaks.
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“We should be protecting workers from hazardous conditions and we will, and those states where they do not, I’m going to be calling them out,” Biden said, later adding that when he played football as a young man, coaches would be fired for refusing players water breaks.
The president further said that the US Forest Service will award more than $1bn in grants to help cities and towns plant trees, “so families have a place to go to cool off”. Tree coverage can help lower temperatures in urban areas by more than 15 degrees fahrenheit.
Speaking further, the president said that the Department of Housing and Urban Development had set aside billions to help communities make their buildings more energy efficient and to open cooling centers.
“The Department of Interior was boosting funding to “expand water storage capacity in the western states”, he said, referring to the earmarking of $152m for water storage and pipelines for the drought-stricken western states, according to the White House.
Biden also highlighted $7m in funding from the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act which the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will use to improve weather forecasts, thereby improving preparedness for extreme weather like heatwaves.
Story was adapted from the Guardian.
