Biden team sees climate ‘emergency’ but powers are limited

With his climate legislation stalled and a Supreme Court case threatening his ability to regulate carbon, President Biden has been leaning more heavily than ever on his own authority to tackle climate change and address what he has called an “existential threat.”

“It’s been challenging,” Gina McCarthy, Biden’s national climate adviser, said in a recent phone interview. “But he’s been acting boldly and he’s not just been waiting around for Congress to act.”

Yet acting on his own to address climate change faces sharp limits. Not only will it take time and money to fulfill Biden’s latest executive actions and kick-start clean-energy manufacturing, he will need help from Congress and private industry to do it.