Steven Hayward on “The Death of Environmentalism”

I’ve spent the last two weeks riding my bike through Italy and Austria, so in lieu of a post, I thought I’d share Steve Hayward’s talk looking back on the Death of Environmentalism from a conservative perspective from last month’s Breakthrough Dialogue. I’ve known Steve since 2007, when he invited me to come meet folks at the American Enterprise Institute after the publication of Break Through. I consider Steve a friend and not just a “thoughtful conservative” but one of the more thoughtful and interesting people I’ve met in the worlds of climate, energy, and environmentalism over the last two decades.

Over the years, Steve has offered lots of advice, criticism, and encouragement. Two insights in particular stand out. The first was that you could construct a pretty credible decarbonization strategy for the United States built around nuclear energy and natural gas - one that would be at least as credible as the mainstream climate and energy agenda centered around wind and solar energy. The second was that to make progress, the climate issue needed to become more like the education issue and less like the abortion issue - one for which both parties offered competing solutions to the problem rather than diametrically oppositional positions as to whether there was any problem at all.

With Donald Trump up in the polls, Democrats scrambling to rebuild their campaign around Kamala Harris, and the odds of Republican control of the White House, Congress, and the Supreme Court on the rise, I thought that Steve’s perspective on the Death of Environmentalism, ecomodernism, and the conquest of environmentalism by climatism would be timely. There is plenty that I don’t agree with Steve about. But I’ve always learned a lot from him. I hope you will too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4pIpEz4KWs&ab_channel=BreakthroughInstitute