During a short exchange on climate change at the most recent Republican presidential debate, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio said, "America is not a planet." He's right. And though Rubio used this argument to justify a do-nothing stance on one of the most pressing issues we face today, a much more serious conversation is happening in America and around the globe on how we can work together to combat the climate crisis.
This week, in the lead-up to a much-anticipated United Nations climate summit in Paris, world leaders in this conversation will converge in New York City to show their commitment to international sustainable development goals. Among them will be two key politicians forcing the conversation in the U.S.: California Gov. Jerry Brown and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
Pope Francis, whose powerful encyclical over the summer made the moral case for better climate policies, will also be in town -- and his presence should make Gov. Cuomo and Gov. Brown a little nervous. The pope's strong statements on the dangers of fossil fuels show that he understands that half measures aren't good enough in the face of a crisis that threatens our planet's biodiversity and millions of the world's poorest people.
The New York convergence is an opportunity for those in positions of power to discuss climate solutions that could make a difference on a global scale. While much of the current conversation has focused on consumption and carbon emissions, a pressing and often overlooked part of the equation is curbing the development of coal, oil and gas.
Though Brown and Cuomo have been celebrated as climate leaders, both are still missing the mark in critical ways when it comes to leaving dirty fossil fuels in the ground.
Brown has been recognized worldwide for calling for a 50 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in California by 2030 by encouraging the proliferation and implementation of renewable energy technologies.
But Brown's own continued support of expanded oil and gas development, including dangerous oil-production techniques like fracking, exposes state residents to dangerous fracking pollution, and risks contamination of California's dwindling water supplies. Today, even as climate change-fueled wildfires and drought ravage the state, California remains the third-largest producer of oil in the country, behind Texas and North Dakota.
For his part, Cuomo delivered a huge victory to local communities and environmental advocates when he announced a fracking ban in natural gas-rich New York late last year. The ban on fracking is the essential first step for the movement against fossil fuels in New York - but it is not the end.
Cuomo must take the next step by rejecting the many fracking infrastructure projects proposed in the state, including the Port Ambrose liquefied natural gas facility off the coast of Long Island, the natural gas storage facility on Seneca Lake and the maze of proposed pipelines crisscrossing the state. The ban on fracking was a historic victory that gives New York a huge opportunity to continue to lead the way on climate change. Governor Cuomo should seize it.
Pope Francis changed the global conversation with his climate encyclical that called out obstructionists and apathy and urged more aggressive action by world leaders. But it's also true that the Catholic Church itself should sever its connections to dangerous fossil fuel projects, like the leasing of church property in a heavily populated area of South Los Angeles for oil drilling.
What these world leaders must understand is that the way to cut our carbon footprint is not through a geographic redistribution of the same supply of polluting fuels. In fact, a recent study found that halting new fossil fuel leasing on America's public lands and oceans would keep up to 450 billion tons of greenhouse gas pollution from reaching the atmosphere.
To truly address climate change, leaders can't skip out on that half of the conversation. While it helps to set limits on consumption, we must also keep oil and gas in the ground and accelerate investment in renewable energies.
Banning all forms of fracking is a simple first step to taking on the oil and gas industry, protecting groundwater sources, reducing methane emissions and tackling the real problem. Climate leaders don't support expansions of the fossil fuel industry that's cooking our climate.
Rose Braz is climate campaign director at the Center for Biological Diversity in California. Alex Beauchamp is Northeast Region Director for Food & Water Watch in New York.