Earth with dry cracks visible in an area of Lake Powell that was previously underwater in Page, Arizona on March 28, 2022. Due to severe drought in parts of the western United States, Lake Powell’s water level dropped to its lowest level when the lake was created in 1963 by a dam on the Colorado River.
Justin Sullivan | Getty Images
Floods, droughts, wildfires and hurricanes could cost the U.S. federal budget about 2 2 trillion a year by the end of this century, the White House said in an assessment Monday.
An analysis by the Office of Management and Budget, which manages the federal budget, found that climate change could hit federal revenue with an annual loss of 7.1% by the end of the century.
The report further states that the federal government may spend an additional $ 25 billion to $ 128 billion each year on expenditures such as coastal disaster relief, flood insurance, crop insurance, health insurance, wildlife firefighting and flooding in federal facilities.
“The financial risks of climate change are enormous,” Candace Walsing, associate director of climate change at OMB, and its chief economist Danny Yagan wrote in a blog post on Monday.
“Climate change threatens communities and sectors across the country, including floods, droughts, extreme heat, fires and hurricanes that affect the US economy and the lives of everyday Americans,” they wrote. “If greenhouse gas emissions continue unabated, future losses could dwarf current losses.”
The news comes on the same day as the much-anticipated report by the UN Climate Science Panel, which warned that greenhouse gas emissions must reach their peak by 2025 to reduce global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius below pre-industrial levels.
The world has already warmed about 1.1 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial levels, and global temperatures are expected to rise by 2.4 degrees Celsius by 2100.
OMB’s analysis warns that the intensity of wildfires could increase federal firefighting costs from $ 1.55 billion to $ 9.60 billion per year, representing an increase between 78% and 480% by the end of the century. Meanwhile, more frequent hurricanes could increase costs for coastal disaster response from $ 22 billion to $ 94 billion per year by the end of the century.
Additionally, 12,000 federal buildings across the country could be flooded by ten feet above sea level, with a total replacement cost of more than $ 43.7 billion, the analysis said. However, for 2100 it will be an extreme sea level rise. A 2021 report by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicts an increase in sea level in the United States between 0.6 meters (about two feet) and 2.2 meters (just over seven). Ft) towards the end of the century.
President Joe Biden last week unveiled his 2023 budget proposal, which calls for nearly 45 45 billion in new funding for climate change, clean energy and environmental justice programs. The budget, which includes an increase of about 60% in the climate fund for fiscal 2021, comes at a time when the president’s key legislation on climate change is stalling in Congress.
The climate portion of the $ 1.75 trillion house-passed bill, called the Build Back Better Act, would be the largest federal clean energy investment of all time and could help nearly half of the president’s pledge to cut emissions by 2030. To the non-partisan analysis firm Rhodium Group.
Earlier this year, Biden said he probably needed to scrap the plan, but he believed Congress would still pass some of it, including spending $ 555 billion on climate change.