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Although it was soon overshadowed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the US Army released a climate strategy in February outlining the military’s understanding of the risks posed by a warmer world and how the Army plans to respond.
It opened with the unambiguous assertion that “[c]limate change endangers national and economic security, and the health and well-being of the American people.”
But the invasion of Ukraine by Russia will likely push the existential risks posed by climate crisis to national and global security further onto the military’s backburner. In addition to causing much human suffering in Ukraine, Russia’s war has mobilized NATO countries in the region and prompted some members, including Germany and the United States, to increase military spending. For many, Putin’s aggression and thinly veiled brandishing of Russian nuclear forces will undoubtedly reaffirm the importance of US conventional and nuclear forces. Meanwhile, Russia’s war machine pumps out greenhouse gas emissions while also causing Widespread destruction and environmental degradation.
Scientists released the second installment of the 6th assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, (IPCC), at the end February. Observed that global warming is occurring faster than predicted, that extreme events combined with ongoing warming are “pushing ecosystems to tipping points, beyond which abrupt and possibly irreversible changes are occurring,” and that the opportunities to avert the worst impacts of global warming through mitigation and adaptation are diminishing. As co-chair of the IPCC working group Hans-Otto Pörtner said, “There is a brief and rapidly closing window to secure a liveable future on the planet.”
The threat that climate change poses for its installations and operations is well understood by the military. “The risks associated with climate change are broad, significant, and urgent” the Army’s climate strategy asserts. “The time to address climate change is now.” Secretary of the Army Christine Wormuth writes in her introduction. “If we do not take action now, across our installations, acquisition and logistics, and training, our options to mitigate these risks will become more constrained with each passing year.”
This is consistent with other statements from the Pentagon. The Pentagon has been concerned about the effects of climate change for decades and has funded scientific research that has been crucial to understanding the processes of global heating. The Department of Defense published an “Road Map to Adaptation” as far back as 2014, followed by a “Climate Adaptation Plan” in September 2021.
But while the US military apparatus clearly understands that climate change is a threat to lives and human security, it does not appear to grasp the scale of its own contribution to the problem, which limits the Army’s ability to mitigate that impact. The Department of Defense is America’s largest institutional energy user and accounts for around 1% of all US emitted. Indeed, the department’s annual emissions are larger than most countries in the world. As the IPCC report makes clear, adaptation is only possible to a point; mitigation and drastic emissions reductions by major polluters—like the US military—are essential to avoid the worst consequences of the climate crisis.
The complex relationship between conflict and climate crisis. The Department of Defense’s “Climate Risk Analysis,” published in October 2021, argues that climate change is already “exacerbating existing risks and creating new challenges for U.S. interests.” Indeed, the US national security establishment takes the adverse consequences of climate change as a foregone conclusion and emphasizes increased risks due to global warming. The October 2021 National Intelligence Estimate, “Climate Change and International Responses: The Increasing Challenges to US National Security through 2040,” for example, highlighted growing competition for resources, including cross-border water tension and conflict and the potential for instability and conflict in Central Africa, a region that will feel the effects of global warming most acutely.
The fact that the Army’s recent assessment echoes what is now seen to be a fait acompli—that a failure to curb emissions will lead to conflict—doesn’t make it so. The link between climate change, armed conflict and it is weak at best. The most recent IPCC report states that “non-climatic factors are the dominant drivers of existing intrastate violent conflicts, in some assessed regions extreme weather and climate events have had a small, adverse impact on their length, severity or frequency, but the statistical association is weak.” Rather, it’s the other way around: because mobilization and war increase greenhouse gas emissions, conflict makes climate change worse. “Violent conflict and, separately, migration patterns, in the near-term will be driven by socio-economic conditions and governance more than by climate change,” the IPCC authors write.
A pledge without any reference point.The Army proposes to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030 as part of its climate strategy. This is compared to 2005 levels. This seems like a lofty goal.
Unfortunately, the Army’s Climate Strategy does not provide its emissions in 2005, which I estimate were some of the highest levels of emissions over the last 20 years. The Army was in war in Afghanistan and Iraq at the time. Since then, the Army has reduced operations and eventually pulled out of both Iraq and Afghanistan wars. It has already switched to less greenhouse gas-intensive fuels, changing the fuel mix used at its installations.
The other service branches have also already reduced their emissions for similar reasons, but the Army’s cuts have been the most significant. The average reduction in emissions for the Air Force was 27%, while that of the Navy was only 14%. From 2010 to 2019, the average decrease in emissions for the entire Department of Defense stood at 28 percent. The total Army’s carbon dioxide equivalent emissions in 2019 were approximately 10.6 million metric tonnes. This is 42 percent lower than the emissions levels of fiscal year 2010.
If the Army’s 2005 emissions were equal or greater than their 2010 emissions, it would seem that the Army is already very close to achieving its reduction target. Further, if the Army’s goal is, as they also state, to reduce emissions from all installations 50 percent by 2032, from a 2005 baseline, they have already reduced installation emissions 33 percent from 2010 to 2019.
The Army says additional emissions reductions will be accomplished by electrifying all non-tactical vehicles, purchasing or producing carbon-pollution-free electricity at installations, and increasing building energy efficiency. The Army plan also says that it will consider the “security implications of climate change in strategy, planning, acquisition, supply chain, and programing documents and processes.” In addition to emissions reductions, the Army has over 13 million acres of land, which it says it intends to manage with an eye to sustainability: “Stewardship of Army lands can also help mitigate climate change threats by safeguarding forests and other beneficial environments alongside Army RDTE and training.”
All of these are important and welcome. It isn’t ambitious. The climate crisis demands ambitious goals and even greater reductions.
Balance between national security and climate action The federal government’s policies appear to be ambivalent if not contradictory regarding whether climate change should be treated as an existential threat. On the one hand, Congress demanded that a plan be developed to reduce military emissions. Particularly, the National Defense Authorization Act, signed in late December 2021, required the “Secretary of Defense submit to Congress a plan to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of the Department of Defense” no later than September 30, 2022. The law does not require the Department to achieve net zero emissions or set a goal.
In fact, while the Biden Administration issued an executive order in December 2021 mandating federal agencies to be “leading the Nation on a firm path to net-zero emissions by 2050,” it exempted national security agencies from the federal government’s net-zero requirement. Specifically, the order stated, “To the maximum extent practicable and without compromising national security, each agency shall strive to comply with the purposes, goals, and implementation steps in this order.”
Clearly, the question then is what is the “maximum extent practicable” that the military can reduce emissions “without compromising national security.” This is a balancing act weighing the certain consequences of climate change—which the Department of Defense views as a threat multiplier—and those that might still be averted, against the potential risks of conflict that might be averted through other means.
The Army has remained true to its original mission and not focused on emissions reduction. “Climate change and its effects obviously pose a very serious threat to the U.S. national security interest,” J.E. Surash, a senior Army officer, spoke out to the Association of the United States ArmyOctober 2021. “But I want to stress that … climate change does not alter the Army’s overall mission, which is to deploy, fight and win.”
The implicit assumption here is that reducing military emissions “too much” could weaken the United States.
The war in Ukraine and mobilization of NATO countries to resist further Russian aggression highlights two facts. First, war is an intensive greenhouse gas emission activity. The destruction of infrastructure, including disruptions to electricity, not only emits greenhouse gases but also the armed forces. The longer the Ukrainian electricity grid is down, then the more trees will need to be cut down and backup diesel generators that produce more emissions will be used. The Russian invasion of Ukraine will likely draw even more attention to the military and divert attention away from emissions reductions in favor a greater military power.
The fact that the US was able reduce its emissions while fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan shows that it is capable of both remaining competent and reducing fuel consumption. Which raises the larger question of how much the US should rely on the military—as compared to the tools of diplomacy, economic incentives, and economic sanctions—to respond to and shape the international security environment.
The world can’t afford to have more wars or more greenhouse gas emissions.
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