Cost of climate crisis? Who will pay | Opinion

On Monday, a single committee vote tabled transformative legislation for the climate crisis in New Mexico, SB4 — The Clear Horizons Act introduced by Senator Mimi Stewart. 

The New Mexico Oil and Gas Association spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on television and social media ads targeting legislators, claiming that common sense emissions reductions would destroy New Mexico’s economy, forgetting to mention those very emissions are super charging climate change.

The global climate crisis has an outsized impact on our hot, high southwestern state. Fierce fires like in Mora and Ruidoso, floods like in Carlsbad and Roswell, and extreme heat and drought across the state are just some of the symptoms. The new species of mosquitoes invading our backyards and worsening allergies are part of climate change. And yes, the freezing weather a few weeks ago came because of warming at the poles pushing the cold air south.  

Meanwhile, the legislature continues to debate an array of bills to absorb the costs of the climate crisis. What can we do about extreme forest fires? How can we create affordable homeowners insurance in the face of these fires? What can we do about our ever dwindling water supplies? How can we pay for zero interest loans and unemployment when disasters hit? And yet the one bill that might have done anything to actually reduce the emissions leading to these disasters was tabled, by one vote.

Northern New Mexicans were told that this bill was about taking away wood-fired stoves and making propane expensive — emissions that don’t even register on the state inventory. In reality SB4 is about ensuring when a global-scale industry extracts gas and oil off our public lands that they do it on our terms. After all, these natural resources belong to us. It’s ironic that companies like Exxon and Chevron have already committed to SB4’s reduction levels globally. 

New Mexico’s nation-leading methane and ozone rules helped us take the first steps towards curbing the incredible waste of industry that was spewing methane gas out of their operations. But satellite imagery shows that industry has a long way to go. Despite that, oil and gas has used its outsized access and influence to laud themselves, claiming that they’re doing a wonderful job complying with the very rules that they energetically challenged in their creation. 

We have the problems, but we also have the solutions. Here in New Mexico we are innovative. Our electric utilities are bringing on more renewables and battery storage than ever and selecting those resources because they are flexible and affordable. The Republicans in the legislature have had a grand time making fun of electric vehicles, but the reality is they can be charged at home cheaply, are cleaner for the occupants of the car, and the communities surrounding them. Kids with asthma in extractive and transportation impacted communities are not laughing. 

Nine kids came to the roundhouse on the day of the vote for SB4. They clearly articulated what the bill does and why they support it. The audience clapped for them wildly and then after they went home for dinner and their homework, the bill failed. 

Will we listen to them or will we listen to the industry that has made more in one quarter than in the entire history of their companies all while letting workers go because of automation? Oil and gas can afford to do better. We can’t afford for them not to.  Will our legislature join our Senate and House champions and the Governor to find a way to tell the people the truth? Let’s not fall for industry’s red herrings.  Let’s require the best from them and the best for our state.