The chances of the United States taking action on climate change have been damaged by the declaration from Senator Joe Manchin III that he cannot support his party's bill.
The follow-up statement from Mr. Manchin was released after he expressed his opposition to the bill in an interview with Fox News Sunday.
Mr. Manchin is the only Democrat in the Senate who can decide whether the bill passes.
Environmentalists were alarmed by the news of his opposition. A professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who has been advising Senate Democrats, said she doesn't think we can tackle the climate crisis at the scale that's necessary without passing this law.
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The administration can use executive action and regulations, but without legislation, it will be hard to achieve President Biden's goal of aggressively cutting the pollution generated by the United States, the country that has historically pumped the most planet-warming gasses into the atmosphere. Environmentalists said that that would have dire stakes.
The legislation would be a climate disaster if it was not passed, said Senator Jeff Merkley.
Mr. Biden and other world leaders have pledged to limit the warming of the planet to 1.5 degrees Celsius, or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit, if they can reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Scientists warn that the planet will tip into an irreversible future of frequent deadly heat waves, wildfires and storms, rising sea levels, food shortages and mass migration. The planet has warmed.
The social programs in the build back better bill are vital, but the climate crisis demands immediate action, according to a professor. The basic physics of the problem cannot be changed. There is a special need to this.
The bill that Mr. Manchin rejected would have made the largest expenditure in the nation's history to address the warming planet. The American economy has been dependent on fossil fuels for 150 years, and the bill would aim to move it away.
The bill relies on incentives for industries, utilities and consumers to shift from burning oil, gas and coal for energy and transportation to tapping into wind, solar and other forms of power that do not emit carbon dioxide, the most plentiful of the greenhouse gases that are.
According to the Rhodium Group, the United States would be about halfway to Mr. Biden's goal of cutting emissions by half by the end of this decade.
Tax incentives for producers and buyers of wind, solar and nuclear power would be $320 billion. Tax credits of up to $12,500 would be given to buyers of electric vehicles. It included $6 billion to make buildings more energy efficient and another $6 billion to replace gas-powered furnaces and appliances with electric versions. Billions of dollars were given for research and development of new technologies to capture carbon dioxide from the air.
The House version of the bill would extend existing tax credits to lower the costs of installing solar panels, small wind turbine and other renewable energy equipment.
Mr. Manchin, who personally profits from investments in a family coal brokerage that he founded, opposed some provisions of the bill that advocates say are vital to reducing the burning of coal, oil and gas.
The clean electricity program that would have rewarded power plants that switched from burning fossil fuels to solar, wind and other clean sources was rejected by Mr. Manchin. He objected to a provision that would have imposed a fee on emissions of methane, a powerful planet-warming pollutant that leaks from oil and gas wells. He was against the provision that would have given tax credits to consumers who purchase electric vehicles.
The provision that would have banned future oil and gas drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts was rejected by him.
The clean energy tax incentive package was backed by major electric utilities according to Senator Ron Wyden, who wrote most of it. Mr. Wyden said that failure is not an option and that this is the last chance to prevent the most catastrophic effects of the climate crisis.
Climate activists from the youth-led groups that had supported Mr. Biden said on Sunday that they were angry and blamed the president and Democratic leadership.
Paul Campion, who joined a hunger strike outside the White House in November to push for passage of the spending package, said that Biden and Pelosi have failed them.
Mr. Campion said that they enabled Senator Manchin to set the terms of the bill. He said that failing to act on climate legislation would have consequences for the Democrats next year.
The executive director of the Sunrise Movement blamed Mr. Biden for not fighting harder for the climate provisions that he championed. It is frustrating to see how he hasn't championed and fought for his agenda in the ways he could have.
She said that the prospects for climate action are quickly disappearing if Democrats lose control of the House in next year's elections. She said that the political map looks more competitive and less promising. They are blowing it and this is our moment.
The main elements of the climate package may be able to be salvaged, according to the senior vice president of energy and environment policy at the Center for American Progress. She said that parts of the bill that passed the House could still pass.
It is not dead. She said that they have been on the Manchin roller coaster for a long time and that he shares his emotions in public. Biden and Manchin should start discussing what is acceptable.
Others weren't sure if there was more room for compromise. The climate provisions are historic and urgent and already a compromise, according to Tiernan Sittenfeld, the senior vice president for government affairs at the League of Voters. There isn't more to give.
