President Biden is rightfully focused on climate. However, his FY22 budget request for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) misses the mark. While the 129-page budget mentions the word “climate” 125 times – nearly once per page – actual impacts of the proposed climate investments – a few which are steps in the right direction – would be minimal.  

Absent major reforms to bioenergy, farm commodity, and crop insurance subsidies, the budget fails to adequately address climate change. Government programs currently on the books are making climate change worse. Biden’s FY22 budget proposes exactly $0 cuts to crop insurance and farm subsidies even though previous Presidential budget requests – under both Republicans and Democrats – found an average of $28 billion in common sense ag-related savings – every year. The current farm subsidy maze promotes risk taking at taxpayer expense and fails to encourage conservation practices that benefit both the climate and producers’ bottom lines. The budget also proposes more spending on “sustainable” aviation fuel tax credits and biofuels infrastructure that is likely to further subsidize mature food-based biofuels that do little, if anything, to mitigate climate risks.  

Here’s an example of one glimmer of hope in the budget, but it pales in comparison to what’s needed to achieve real, lasting climate solutions:  

• Crop insurance actuarial soundness:  $2 million to “research, review, and ensure actuarial soundness of new products addressing climate change,” a great first step. Unfortunately, the budget abandons common sense, risk-reducing crop insurance reforms that have been proposed by every administration in recent history, even when now-President Biden was Vice President Biden under the Obama Administration. With crop insurance expected to cost taxpayers approximately $9 billion annually over the next decade, ignoring the elephant in the room will not help solve climate change.   

The USDA budget request details $1.5 billion in climate-related discretionary spending, specifically on “climate smart agriculture and… forestry” and “clean energy activities.” However, not all clean energy investments are good for the climate. Case in point – biofuels and biomass.  

Just a few examples of proposed climate spending that either may do more harm than good in practice and/or not enough details are provided to determine potential climate – and taxpayer – impacts include the following:   

• Climate Science  

• • $95 million for Advanced Research Projects Agency Climate (ARPA-C) 
  • $92 million “at the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) will support the livestock protection program, the crop production program, and the food safety program.” 
  • $21 million “for the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) to establish a coordinated, corporate approach to outreach across NRCS program delivery…”
• Climate Hubs 

• • $23 million for USDA climate hubs 

• “Clean” Energy  

• • $431 million “for Rural Development, of which $400 million will be used directly to provide incentives for rural electric providers to increase de-carbonization as they accelerate to carbon pollution free production by 2035” 
  • $99 million “for Agricultural Research Service (ARS) to further innovation to optimize clean energy technologies and system integration.” 
  • $17 million for “development of climate smart and carbon neutral agriculture… to sequester carbon and use clean energy to achieve net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050.” 
  • $17 million “for the Forest Service to support clean energy research and development for biomass to bioenergy markets especially with technologies suitable for low-value woody biomass.” 

Other budget proposals would spend taxpayer dollars on wood innovation grants for biochar, woody biomass, and other technologies. However, further subsidizing woody biomass though rural electric loans and grants, the Forest Service, or even increased spending in the Rural Energy for America Program (REAP) will fail to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and help achieve the president’s climate goals. In addition to the $400 million for Rural Development electric providers, the administration is also proposing $10 billion to retire power plants and replace them with carbon-free energy sources. Subsidizing the burning of trees for biomass energy is not carbon-neutral, however, nor is plowing carbon-rich grasslands to plant more corn and soybeans for aviation fuel or biofuel production.  

As the budget’s Analytical Perspectives document notes,   

“Another primary risk not addressed in the long-run economic assumptions or baseline budget projections is the impact of climate change. Climate change will likely have significant effects on the long-run fiscal outlook. The Administration is undertaking additional analysis to assess these long-run impacts. The Budget’s climate policies serve to mitigate long-run impacts of climate change.” 

While climate change already has a major impact on federal expenditures, and will continue to do so in the future, the administration mustn’t simply throw more money at the problem and hope perverse ag and bioenergy subsidies that increase GHG emissions will disappear.  

The administration must also heed the Government Accountability Office’s (GAO) advice and as a start, “incentivize climate resilience by incorporating it into the requirements for receiving payments from federal flood and crop insurance programs.” Specifically, GAO recommended that USDA incorporate “long-term resilience into the good farming practices that are required for claim payments” in crop insurance. However, USDA had not implemented these common-sense, risk-reducing reforms as of Dec. 2020.  

If the administration is real about addressing climate change, current policies’ contribution to the problem shouldn’t be ignored.