Navy Secretary John Phelan said he is revoking a naval plan that focuses on combating climate change established by the Biden administration.
“Today, I'm focusing on the fighters first, and I'm revoking the Biden administration's climate action plan,” he said in a video posted to X on Tuesday. “Our focus needs to be on lethality and wartime.” [emphasis, links added]
The program is led by Meredith Berger, who oversees senior naval civilians in energy, facilities and the environment during the 2022 Biden administration.
“2030 is the mark we first proposed because the scientific community and others say it is a decade of decisive action, so we are very serious about it,” she told reporters at the time.
Department of Defense officials are particularly concerned that the Marines' famous East Coast training ground, Paris Island, South Carolina, may be underwater by 2099.
Today, I am revoking the Biden administration’s Naval Climate Action 2030 plan.
We need to focus on having lethal and ready-made naval power, which is not hampered by the regulations of ideological motivations.
Our goal is to be peaceful through strength. pic.twitter.com/fworzm5le0
– Secretary of the Navy John C. Phelan (@secnav) April 22, 2025
[…snip…]
This is not the first time the Republican administration has mastered the Pentagon efforts around climate change.
Ray Mabus, who served as Secnav during the Obama administration, proposed an effort called the “Great Green Fleet” that focused primarily on warships relying on other sources of energy.
But when President Donald Trump occupied the White House in 2017, Republican suspicion quickly destroyed the project.
Asked about the possibility of continuous government discarding climate plans, Berger told the Breaking Defense at the time, “We are moving towards success and making sure we are the best fighters, so I hope this is not a polarization goal because I think everyone wants to see the mission succeed.”
William Rudolph
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