Local View: With Reinert, more questions than answers on climate ... - Duluth News Tribune
Local View: With Reinert, more questions than answers on climate change - Duluth News Tribune | News, weather, and sports from Duluth, Minnesota
Local View: With Reinert, more questions than answers on climate change
From the column: "He sees climate action as an individual responsibility. In his view, city government is reduced to a mere clean-up crew that might look at upgrading impacted infrastructure."
Incumbent Emily Larson and her opponent Roger Reinert are locked in an intense contest for the mayor’s office in Duluth. With so much going on in the climate space locally, what can we learn about these two candidates?
Full disclosure, I contributed to Mayor Larson’s last campaign but to neither campaign this time around.
Mayor Larson has a track record of climate accomplishments. The Energy Plan Commission was formed, which is doing great work, making city operations more efficient and now expanding to the city as a whole. An insanely well-timed investment in solar energy was made, saving taxpayers money. The wasteful downtown heat district was converted from a single-use system into an efficient recirculating system.
Mayor Larson also listened and hired a sustainability officer. This hardworking civil servant has secured $33 million in grants from the federal government for climate-attuned street work and a district-geothermal system using the waste heat from the WLSSD sewer plant to move more than 2,300 homes and businesses off natural gas, a potent greenhouse gas. Only 11 other cities were awarded this grant in the entire nation.
Mr. Reinert served as Duluth’s state senator for eight years, from 2008 to 2016. From a climate perspective, he authored a resolution asking Congress to do something about climate change, a bonding request for the downtown heat district described above, a bonding request for the Northern Lights Express train, and various bills regarding biofuels and natural-gas use in heavy trucking.
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More importantly, what are the future climate plans of the candidates?
To its great credit, the League of Women Voters asked about the candidates’ climate plans. You can watch their answers 46:13 of the LWV Duluth forum, which can be found via PACT-TV or on YouTube by searching “League of Women Voters of Duluth Mayoral Candidate Forum.”
Mayor Larson gave a thorough answer emphasizing “integrated thinking” for climate action. Then, Mr. Reinert, who didn’t seek the DFL endorsement in this race, opened by stating that one city cannot change the climate, an obviously incorrect assertion. Rather, he sees climate action as an individual responsibility. In his view, city government is reduced to a mere clean-up crew that might look at upgrading impacted infrastructure.
Mr. Reinert seemed to be channeling his inner former Republican Vice President Dick Cheney who famously asserted that conservation is a “personal virtue” with no place in public policy.
This seemed to be very odd thinking from someone who wishes to preside over Comfort Systems, the city-owned natural gas utility that is probably responsible for more climate change than any other fossil fuel when adding combustion products and fugitive emissions. It did, however, help to explain why he doesn’t often mention climate change, unlike Mayor Larson. Ideologically, he has no need to develop a climate plan for the city. With millions of dollars on the line and an opportunity to improve the lives of all Duluthians with a solid climate plan, this is a serious omission on the part of Mr. Reinert.
Duluthians need to know more. Would Mr. Reinert keep the sustainability office and expand it? Is he in support of the federal grants to revamp West Superior Street and use WLSSD waste heat to replace coal and natural gas for the downtown heat district? Is he willing to build off the district-geothermal system to decrease the use of natural gas? The first investment in solar was a financial success; would he expand it? Will he aggressively pursue the city’s goal of net zero by 2050?
Climate-minded Duluth voters need to demand answers before casting their ballots in the Nov. 7 election.
Dr. Eric Enberg is a member of the Northland Chapter of Citizens' Climate Lobby, the Duluth Climate and Energy Network, and Healthcare Professionals for a Healthy Climate. He practices family medicine in West Duluth.
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Related Knowledge Center: Climate science
What began as a theory in the 1890s — that industrial emissions of carbon dioxide could increase global temperatures — had progressed to a scientific fact a century later. Scientists across a range of disciplines are studying the impact of the still-growing concentration of carbon dioxide and other so-called “greenhouse gases” in the atmosphere as they call for industrial and governmental policies to slow, then halt, the warming of the planet.