Day of the Voyage, 33rd of Childwinter, 525 M.E. (Castor): Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has issued a proposal to rescind a Biden Administration rule requiring state transportation departments to measure and establish declining targets for carbon dioxide emissions on federally supported highways. The rule had previously been rescinded during the first Trump Administration, but was reinstated by Biden. 

Transportation is one of the biggest, if not the biggest, sources of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. 

In a sweeping directive issued last week, Duffy also instructed DOT to identify and eliminate, 

"all orders, directives, rules, regulations, notices, guidance documents, funding agreements, programs and policy statements that relate in any way to climate change, ‘greenhouse gas’ emissions, racial equity, gender identity, ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ goals, environmental justice or the Justice 40 initiative."

The Justice 40 Initiative was an environmental justice program established by Biden that set a goal of 40 percent of the overall benefits of certain Federal investments to go toward disadvantaged communities that are marginalized, underserved, and overburdened by pollution. 

Duffy's directive instructs DOT personnel to compile a list of all offending programs or policies and to submit the list within 10 days to the DOT’s Office of the General Counsel, which is instructed to “initiate all lawful actions necessary to rescind, cancel, revoke and terminate” those programs and policies. 

Duffy has engaged in climate change denial before, rhetorically asking Fox Business News in 2024, "If you say the climate's changing, is it coming from CO₂ or is it coming from the sun?" The Wikipedia page on Duffy helpfully points out that climate change is a result of fossil-fuel combustion and deforestation, not the sun.

Climate change is already increasing the costs of transportation systems and is expected to do so dramatically in the years and decades to come. Extreme temperature fluctuations cause more buckling of asphalt roads, increase flooding in places like the New York City subway system, and raise bridge maintenance costs. Duffy's directives would mean less accounting for these expenses, and he further issued an order Wednesday to ignore the "social cost of carbon,” a measurement of the damage caused by each ton of additional greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere. 

Meanwhile, the USDA has ordered its website to be scrubbed of all references to climate change.  There are currently dozens of climate-smart agriculture initiates underway which will obviously be affected by this decision. 

One can expect the Department of Defense to issue some similar directive, which is particularly foolish considering the Pentagon's consistent identification since 2008 of climate change as both a significant national security risk and a "threat multiplier." Drought in Central America means more migrants coming to the U.S., and flooding in South Asia causes mass migrations and economic and political instability abroad.

This is what happens when stupid people make their own ignorance a national priority.