Obama planning $1bn climate protection fund

A sign over a highway in Glendale, California urges motorists to save water in response to the state’s severe drought. Obama is visiting drought-stricken California and was expected to announce more than $100mn in federal financial aid to help California recover from the crippling drought that is threatening the state’s agriculture industry.

AFP/Washington

He will propose the investment in his 2015 budget that will be released next month - though it is unclear whether the fund has much prospect of advancing past Republicans on Capitol Hill.

“We’ve always had heat waves, but now the worst ones are longer, and they’re hotter,” said White House spokesman Jay Carney. “We’ve always had droughts, but the worst ones are getting longer and drier.

“We’ve always had severe storms, but instead of hundred-year storms that happen once a hundred years, we’re having hundred-year storms that happen every other year or every five years.”

The new Climate Resilience Fund is intended to finance research into better understanding of projected impacts of climate change and how to better protect communities and infrastructure.

It is also designed to help vulnerable communities plan and prepare for the impacts of climate change and to encourage local measures to reduce risk and to fund resilient technologies and infrastructure to combat a warming climate.

Obama will travel to Fresno, for a roundtable discussion with farmers on the drought which has turned parts of the state’s lush farmland into a Dust-bowl type moonscape.

Around 90% of California is reported to be experiencing severe to exceptional drought.

The drought emergency has also sparked wildfires and prompted Governor Jerry Brown to ask Californians to cut their water use by 20%.

Obama will pledge to implement $100mn in livestock disaster assistance for California producers contained in a recently passed agriculture bill.

He will also highlight $15mn in conservation funding for extreme drought areas in California, Texas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Colorado and New Mexico.

A further $5mn will be provided for emergency watershed protection for California, among other measures which also include a mandate for federal facilities to use less water.