Jim Warren: Taking on Duke Energy

The global climate crisis is harming North Carolinians in many ways, as documented by the March 12 Point of View “When warming consequences disrupt lives,” in farming, fishing, tourism and more. Heat waves, droughts and super storms are devastating millions of people worldwide and are on track to, perhaps abruptly, outstrip this state’s ability to cope.

After all these years, it is astounding that this state’s news media, academics and progressive political leaders, to the extent they mention climate change at all, continue ignoring two key questions: What are we doing that contributes to this threat to humanity? Is there anything we might do to help avert catastrophe?

The elephant in the room is Duke Energy, the nation’s largest carbon-polluting utility, based in Charlotte.

Duke is driving carbon emissions higher at the worst possible time. By planning to build 15 fracking-gas power plants in the Carolinas and pipelines to supply them, Duke is crashing headlong into some cold, hard facts: Methane leakage is the nation’s leading greenhouse gas problem and fracking economics is increasingly risky.

Our strong academic and media outlets and people of goodwill across the political spectrum must demand open debate about our climate and energy challenges.

This story was originally published April 11, 2016 at 6:05 PM with the headline "Jim Warren: Taking on Duke Energy."