Hill Heat

Two former Obama Administration officials discuss how the United States might address climate change with foreign policy measures. They argue for “a full mobilization at home and an unhesitating commitment to leadership abroad” along with a willingness to use American “political capital and economic resources to drive the decarbonization of the global economy.”

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Speakers:

• John Podesta is the founder and a member of the Board of Directors for the Center for American Progress. Podesta served as counselor to President Barack Obama, where he was responsible for coordinating the administration’s climate policy and initiatives. In 2008, he served as co-chair of President Obama’s transition team. He was a member of the U.N. Secretary General’s High-Level Panel of Eminent Persons on the Post-2015 Development Agenda. Podesta previously served as White House chief of staff to President William J. Clinton. He chaired Hillary Clinton’s campaign for president in 2016.
• Todd Stern is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution concentrating on climate change. Stern served from January 2009 until April 2016, as the special envoy for climate change at the Department of State. He was President Obama’s chief climate negotiator, leading the U.S. effort in negotiating the Paris Agreement and in all bilateral and multilateral climate negotiations in the seven years leading up to Paris. Stern also participated in the development of U.S. domestic climate and clean energy policy. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Moderators

• William Antholis serves as director and CEO of the Miller Center. Immediately prior, he was managing director at The Brookings Institution, and from 1995 to 1999 he served in government. At the White House, he was director of international economic affairs on the staff of the National Security Council and National Economic Council, where he served as the chief staff person for the G8 Summits in 1997 and 1998. Antholis is the author of Inside Out India and China: Local Politics Go Global and, with Strobe Talbot, Fast Forward: Ethics and Politics in the Age of Global Warming.
• Deborah Lawrence is a professor of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia. Her research focuses on the links between tropical deforestation and climate change. She has spent the past twenty-five years doing field-based research in Indonesia, Costa Rica, Mexico and Cameroon. Professor Lawrence and her students conduct interdisciplinary research with partners in hydrology, atmospheric science, economics, anthropology, ethics, engineering, and law to understand the drivers and consequences of land use change. This work has gained her a Sustainability Science Award from the Ecological Society of America, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Jefferson Science Fellowship from the National Academy of Sciences, and a Fulbright Scholarship.

You’ve seen the headlines. Ice in the Arctic is melting at record rates and warming at twice the global average – and the Trump administration continues to hand over control of the Arctic to Big Oil. We’re hosting a forum on Monday, October 5, to learn how the higher temperatures are wreaking havoc on wildlife, fisheries and humans who have call the Arctic home for generations.

This hearing will explore the ways that the climate crisis exacerbates economic harm and injustice, and identify strategies to strengthen financial systems and enhance access to capital to support community resilience and economic recovery.

Witnesses:

• Rostin Behnam, Commissioner, Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). As sponsor of the CFTC’s Market Risk Advisory Committee (MRAC), Commissioner Behnam engages leading market experts and public consumer groups on issues relating to evolving market structures and movement of risk across clearinghouses, exchanges, intermediaries, market makers, and end-users. Commissioner Behnam convened the Climate-Related Market Risk Subcommittee to provide a report to the MRAC on climate-related financial and market risks.
• Joanna Syroka, Senior Underwriter and Director of New Markets, Fermat Capital Management. Dr. Syroka has extensive experience in structuring and placing risk transfer programs in both emerging and developed markets. Prior to joining Fermat Capital in 2017, she was the director of research & development at African Risk Capacity (ARC), Africa’s first sovereign insurance pool, which she helped design and establish in 2012. At ARC, she led the development of their parametric drought, flood, cyclone, pandemic, and climate insurance initiatives.
• Maggie Monast, Director of Working Lands, Environmental Defense Fund. Monast works with farmers, food companies, agricultural organizations, and others to create an agricultural system that drives climate stability, clean water, and food security. Specifically, Monast works to quantify the farm financial impacts of conservation practice adoption, collaborates with major corporations to develop sustainability initiatives, and develops innovative financial incentives to advance sustainable agriculture.
• Rich Powell, Executive Director, ClearPath. Powell leads ClearPath, whose mission is to develop and advance conservative policies that accelerate clean energy innovation. Rich served as a member of the 2019 Advisory Committee to the Export Import Bank of the United States. He is also on the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center’s Advisory Group.

Text of HR 5986

Witnesses

• Dr. Robert Bullard Professor of Urban Planning and Environmental Policy at Texas Southern University and Father of environmental justice
• Dr. Mildred McLain Co-founder and Executive Director of the Harambee House/Citizens for Environmental Justice.
• Andrea Vidaurre Co-Founder of People’s Collective for Environmental Justice
• Derrick Hollie (Minority Witness) President, Reaching America

• Hearing memorandum
• Frank Pallone opening statement Witnesses
• Ariel Drehobl, Senior Research Associate, Local Policy American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy
• Tony G. Reames, Ph.D., Assistant Professor School for Environment and Sustainability University of Michigan
• Robert Bryce, Visiting Fellow The Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity
• Alexandra M. Wyatt Policy and Regulatory Manager GRID Alternatives

Witnesses

Panel One

• Kevin D. Norton Acting Chief, Natural Resources Conservation Service, Washington, D.C.

Panel Two

• Tim Palmer President, National Association of Conservation Districts, Truro, IA
• Steve Patterson Senior Vice President, Corporate Marketing, Communications and Government Affairs, Southern States Cooperative, Henrico, VA
• Dr. Karen Waldrop Chief Conservation Officer, Ducks Unlimited, Memphis, TN
• Johnathan Coppess Assistant Professor, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL

Opening Statements

• Chairwoman Mikie Sherrill (D-NJ) of the Subcommittee on Environment
• Chairwoman Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX)

Witnesses

• Dr. Roxane Cohen Silver, Professor of Psychological Science, Medicine, and Public Health, University of California, Irvine
• Dr. Samantha Montano, Assistant Professor of Emergency Management, Massachusetts Maritime Academy

• Chair Spanberger Opening Statement

Witness:

• John Phipps, Deputy Chief for State and Private Forestry, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Washington, DC

Panelists:

• Dr. Beverly Wright, Executive Director of the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice
• Dr. Robert D. Bullard, Professor of Urban Planning and Environmental Policy at Texas Southern University
• Dr. N’Taki Osborne Jelks Assistant professor in environmental and health sciences at Spelman College in Atlanta.
• Joy Semien, graduate of Dillard University (B.S.), Texas Southern University (M.A.)