On December 7, 1941, Japan’s surprise attack on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor killed more than 2,000 people and drew the country into World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the War Production Board to oversee the mobilization, as factories that once produced civilian goods began churning out tanks, warplanes, ships, and armaments. Food, gasoline, even shoes were rationed, and the production of cars, vacuum cleaners, radios, and sewing machines was halted (the steel, rubber, and glass were needed for the war industries). Similar mobilizations occurred in England and the Soviet Union.

Today, some environmentalists want to see a similarly massive effort in response to a different type of existential threat: climate change.

These proponents of climate mobilization call for the federal government to use its power to reduce carbon emissions to zero as soon as possible, an economic shift no less substantial and disruptive than during WWII. New coal-fired power plants would be banned, and many existing ones shut down; offshore drilling and fracking might also cease. Meat and livestock production would be drastically reduced. Cars and airplane factories would instead produce solar panels, wind turbines, and other renewable energy equipment. Americans who insisted on driving and flying would face steeper taxes.

Wikimedia commons/ U.S. National Archives and Records Administration

Though climate mobilization has existed as a concept for as many as 50 years, it’s only now entering the mainstream. Green group The Climate Mobilization pushed the idea during a protest at the April 22 signing of the Paris Agreement. On April 27, Senators Barbara Boxer and Richard Durbin introduced a bill that would allow the Treasury to sell $200 million each year in climate change bonds modeled after WWII War Bonds. Bernie Sanders has mentioned mobilization on the campaign trail and in a debate. And Hillary Clinton’s campaign announced last week that if she’s elected, she plans to install a “Climate Map Room” in the White House inspired by the war map room used by Roosevelt during World War II.

Despite these inroads, climate mobilization remains a fringe idea. Its supporters don’t entirely agree on the answers to key questions, such as: What will trigger this mobilization—a catastrophic event or global alliance? Who will lead this global effort? When will the mobilization start? And perhaps the greatest hurdle isn’t logistical or technical, but psychological: convincing enough people that climate change is a greater threat to our way of life than even the Axis powers were.

