U.S. President Joe Biden said on Wednesday that climate change is an emergency but stopped short of a formal declaration, announcing a modest package of executive actions and promising more aggressive efforts.
Biden made the comments during a visit to Massachusetts and as a historic heat wave batters Europe and the United States. Some 100 million Americans from New York City to Las Vegas will be under heat warnings this week.
"Climate change is literally an existential threat to our nation and to the world," Biden said. "This is an emergency, an emergency, and I will look at it that way."