A recent Climate Action Tracker (CAT) report reveals in stark and sobering terms that the response of this system to the severe disruptions of energy production and distribution triggered by the Russia-NATO proxy war in Ukraine has been to massively EXPAND planet-heating fossil fuels.1
In July 2022, the Supreme Court forbade the EPA from writing sweeping regulations governing carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. Here, the Dave Johnston coal-fired power plant in Glenrock, Wyoming, the top coal-producing state in the U.S. since 1986. Photo: AP
Eight liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminals operate in the U.S. like this one in Louisiana. In 2023, they exported an average of 11.6 billion cubic feet of LNG per day. Photo: AP
The Russian invasion of Ukraine, now entering its fifth month, with its intensification of the inter-imperialist rivalry between the NATO military alliance of Western imperialists (led by the U.S.) and Russia, has led to global food and energy shortages, triggering widespread human suffering. This invasion, and the NATO response of sanctions and massive shipments of weapons, has upended the global supply of energy. Russia is a major exporter of, among other crucial foodstuffs and raw materials, oil and natural gas, particularly to Europe. Germany, Europe’s largest economy, for example, received 40 percent of its oil and over 55 percent of its natural gas from Russia prior to the war.2 On July 11, Russia shut down the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, which is the main source of natural gas from Russia to Germany. And eleven other European Union (EU) countries have had oil and gas supplies from Russia either halted or severely curtailed.3
And what has been the response to this energy crisis from these NATO country leaders? To accelerate the energy shift from fossil fuel (oil, coal, and natural gas) sources to renewable (wind, solar, geothermal, tidal, etc.) ones? Or even to use this calamitous situation—as U.S. “climate thought leader” turned shameless cheerleader for Western imperialism Bill McKibben has argued for—to rapidly decarbonize Europe and transition to renewable energy, thus weakening and helping to defeat Russia4? Not even close. Instead, the recent CAT report documents what has been actually happening: a global “gold rush” of new fossil fuel investments and production, particularly of liquified natural gas (LNG), a fuel source often presented as “cleaner” than oil and coal, but which in reality may actually have a higher greenhouse gas footprint than coal.5 And Biden is pushing Saudi Arabia to rapidly increase oil production.
In other words, what this system is doing is the exact fucking opposite of what MUST happen—radical REDUCTIONS in emissions, and the rapid cessation of fossil fuel operations—if we have any real chance of preventing the worst impacts of the climate crisis. What we are witnessing is imperialist “geoeconomics” in play: Western imperialism, led by the U.S., ramping up fossil-fuel production to counter Russia's moves to expand its empire. The planet be damned!
The CAT report outlines how this system’s response to the curtailment of oil and gas supplies from Russia has been to seek out other sources for these planet-warming fossil fuels. This has included ramping up production and export to Europe of LNG in countries like the U.S., the expansion of LNG import infrastructure in Europe, and the bringing online of new countries such as Senegal to begin extracting and exporting LNG. In other words, this new “gold rush” represents a further tethering of the global capitalist-imperialist system to complete dependence on fossil fuels.
At this moment there’s a fresh round of investment in the billions of dollars into fossil fuel technology and infrastructure—what’s called “sunk capital”—with all the decades of expected profits these investments represent. These investments, if realized, would completely sink any chance of stopping runaway, catastrophic climate change. They also lay bare the inner workings and very nature of this system: the rule of profit and imperialist control over the planet subordinate all other considerations, and EVEN THE VERY EXISTENCE OF A LIVABLE PLANET falls by the wayside. The “policy suggestions” offered in the CAT report for states and private companies to put the interests of humanity and the planet ahead of their quest for the most profitable return on their investment are deadly illusions. This system will not and CANNOT stop plundering the planet and its people for profit. To do so would GO AGAINST THE VERY NATURE OF THIS CAPITALIST SYSTEM.6
There is the basis, the possibility, to radically shift away from an economy that is dependent on planet-burning fossil fuels. But this can only happen through revolution—a revolution that sweeps aside this system and brings into being a socialist system, which puts the economy into the hands of a radically different state, guided by radically different rules and principles.7 This socialist state power serves the interests of world humanity and the advance of the world communist revolution to end all exploitation and oppression... and to safeguard the planet.
The hour is indeed getting late, which is all the more reason to cast aside deadly illusions about reforming this system, and to engage with the only actual solution to the climate crisis—Bob Avakian’s strategy for an actual revolution, a revolution that becomes more possible in these extreme times, and his vision for a future socialist society on the road to communism.
SYSTEM CHANGE NOT CLIMATE CHANGE!
SYSTEM CHANGE MEANS A REAL REVOLUTION!
WE NEED REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS!
Out of the horse’s mouth—a fossil fuel capitalist exposes himself
The New York Times ran an article about Charif Souki, a U.S. capitalist investing right now in liquified natural gas (LNG), which contains the following naked self-exposure:
“All of a sudden, Europe has put all of its climate aspiration on the back burner,” he [Souki] told me, reviewing the early events of the war. Countries like the Czech Republic, Italy and Romania were warning that they might have to reactivate their shuttered coal plants or extend the life spans of those that had been scheduled to close. “We’re going to need gas,” he said, “especially if you’re serious about climate issues.”
He was quick to clarify that this wasn’t his concern. “As a company, I couldn’t care less about the climate,” he said. “Of course I care, OK? But my responsibility is not to care about the climate. My job is to make a product that people need and sell it to them at the cheapest possible price to me.”
This guy is putting into his own words that as a capitalist, his “job” is not to care about the climate. This is a clear expression of the important truth revealed by Karl Marx, the founder of the science of communism, that “As a capitalist, he is only capital personified.” In other words, IT DOESN’T MATTER whether or not these planet-destroying system functionaries actually care about saving the planet. Because as REPRESENTATIVES OF the competitive economic workings of THIS SYSTEM, they are COMPELLED to seek out profits, and more profits. This is why, under this system, we have no chance of preventing the worst impacts of the climate crisis. Fossil fuels are deeply embedded in the profitable functioning and strategic-military requirements of the capitalist-imperialist system that dominates the world.