President Donald Trump said on Monday he would pull the United States out of the landmark Paris climate accord again, dealing a blow worldwide efforts to combat global warming and further distance the US from its closest allies.
The advertisementthat day came Mr. Trump was sworn in to a second term, similar to Trump's actions in 2017when he announced that the US would abandon the global Paris agreement. President Biden back again.
As he put his name a series of executive actions after his inauguration, Mr. Trump said, “I am withdrawing immediately from the Paris Climate Accords unilaterally. He also signed a letter informing the UN of his decision.
The contract is aimed at limiting long-term global warming to 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit (1.5 degrees Celsius) above pre-industrial levels or, failing that, keeping temperatures at least well below 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius) above pre-industrial levels. The US is one of the highest in the world carbon pollution nations.
The 2015 Paris agreement is voluntary and allows countries to set targets to cut their own greenhouse gas emissions from burning coal, oil and natural gas. These targets are meant to get tougher over time, with countries facing a February 2025 deadline for new individual plans.
The outgoing Biden administration last month offer a plan to cut US greenhouse gas emissions exceed 60% by 2035.
Laurence Tubiana, CEO of the European Climate Foundation and a key architect of the Paris agreement, called the planned US withdrawal unfortunate but said action to reduce climate change is “stronger than politics and policies of any country.”
The global context for Trump's action is “very different from 2017,” Tubiana said, adding that “behind the global trend is an unstable economic trend, which the US has benefited from and has guidance but which is now in danger of being removed.”
The International Energy Agency expects the global market for key clean energy technologies to triple to more than $2 trillion by 2035, she said.
“The impact of the climate crisis is also getting worse terrible wildfires in Los Angeles is the latest reminder that Americans, like everyone else, are being affected by climate change,” said Tubiana.
Gina McCarthy, a former White House climate adviser under President Joe Biden, a Democrat, said that if Trump, a Republican, “really wants America to lead the world economy, be non- dependent on energy and creating good-paying American jobs,” he said. We must “stay focused on growing our clean energy industry. Clean technologies are lowering energy costs for people across our country.”
The world is now 2.3 degrees Fahrenheit (1.3 degrees Celsius) above mid-1800s temperatures. Most, but not all, climate research groups said global temperatures last year exceeded the 2.7 degree Fahrenheit warming mark, and all said it was the warmest year on record. ever recorded.
Without further reductions over the next few years, the world is on track to see a temperature increase of more than 3 degrees Celsius, according to October UN reportwho warned that such an outcome would “debilitate people, planet and economies. “
The process of withdrawing from the Paris agreement will take one year. Trump's previous withdrawal took effect the day after the 2020 presidential election, which he lost to Biden.
While the first Trump-led withdrawal from special UN treaty – adopted by 196 nations – surprised and angered countries around the world, “not one country followed the US out the door,” said longtime climate negotiations analyst Alden Meyer by the European think tank E3G.
Instead, other countries renewed their commitment to slowing climate change, along with investors, businesses, regulators, mayors and others in the US, Meyer and other experts said.
However, they lamented the loss of US leadership in global efforts to slow climate change, even as the world is set for another hot year and has been leaving from drought to hurricane to flood to wildfire.
“America is clearly not going to play a major role in helping to solve the climate crisis, the biggest dilemma humans have ever faced,” said climate activist and writer Bill McKibben. “For the next few years the best we can hope for is that Washington does not succeed in destroying the efforts of others.”
About half of Americans “somewhat” or “strongly” oppose the US withdrawing from the climate accord, and even Republicans are not overwhelmingly in favor, according to poll from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Only about 2 in 10 US adults are “somewhat” or “strongly” in favor of withdrawing from the Paris accord, and about a quarter are neutral.
Much of the opposition to the US withdrawal comes from Democrats, but Republicans also show some uncertainty. Just under half of Republicans are in favor of withdrawing from the climate accord, and about 2 in 10 are against it.
Several years ago, China overtook the United States as the world's largest annual emitter of carbon dioxide. The US – the second largest annual carbon polluter – will put 4.9 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide into the air in 2023, down 11% from a decade earlier, according to the scientists who will ' tracking emissions for the Global Carbon Project.
But carbon dioxide It stays in the atmosphere for centuries, so the United States has put more of the heat-trapping gas that is now in the air than any other country. The US is responsible for nearly 22% of the carbon dioxide put into the atmosphere since 1950, according to the Global Carbon Project.
While global efforts to combat climate change continued in Trump's first term, many experts worry that Trump's second term will be more damaging, with the United States pulling back even further from conventional efforts. climate in a way that could undermine future presidential efforts. With Trump, who has dismissed climate change, in charge of the world's leading economy, these experts fear that other countries, especially China, could use it as an excuse to scale back their efforts. reduce itself to reduce carbon emissions.
Simon Stiell, the UN's climate change executive secretary, hoped that the US would continue to embrace the rise of global clean energy.
“Ignoring it will only send that great wealth to competitive economies, while climate disasters like droughts, wildfires and superstorms get worse,” Stiell said. “The door remains open to the Paris Agreement, and we welcome constructive dialogue from any and all countries.”
