The US’s second withdrawal from the Paris Agreement was not unexpected. Even before he was re-elected, current President Donald Trump promised for months He said he would pull the country out of the U.N. agreement to curb global warming: Climate in Paris.Rip-off” he called it.
Still, the sound of President Trump’s black sharpie scratch the signature line Presidential Decree–Putting America first in international environmental agreements” – This week, as climate experts, diplomats, and concerned members of the public observed global climate change, there seemed to be repercussions around the world. largest emitter in history greenhouse gas Turn your back on Accord.
The 2015 Paris Agreement is a treaty signed by 196 countries that limits global warming to “well below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit)” and ideally limits temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit. We have agreed to limit the temperature to 2.7 degrees. Almost every year since then, countries have met annually to discuss the specifics of the agreement and, at least in theory, to reach further agreement on how to deal with climate change. This annual meeting, known as the Conference of the Parties or COP, is the main venue where America’s withdrawal will be felt.
The most direct impact is economic. Withdrawing from the Paris climate accord, which comes a year after President Trump notified the United Nations of his intention to withdraw, will no longer contribute to the flow of funds intended to help the United States transition away from fossil fuels and prepare for its impact. means not. About climate change. President Trump’s executive order said to “revoke and revoke” U.S. powers international climate finance programhas launched a whole-of-government strategy to reduce public investment in international fossil fuel projects while increasing investment in overseas clean energy and adaptation financing.
In 2024, the US Congress will 1 billion dollars This country has contributed to climate mitigation in developing countries. less than other countries The biggest cause of climate change is germany and japan. The Climate Action Tracker, an independent scientific project run by three research institutions, rates the U.S. contribution to climate finance as “critically insufficient,” but some experts say the U.S. They have expressed concern that a complete suspension of funding could have an impact. cooling effect Regarding donations from other donor countries.
Still, even if the United States does not join the Paris Agreement, the pace of climate change progress is unlikely to change dramatically. The reason for this is that there are several treaty structures. First, the 2015 agreement did not bind the United States to specific emissions cuts. It simply required the United States to submit Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) every five years. The United States has dutifully done so, but it has not followed the goals set by the signatories to the agreement. Former President Joe Biden’s last full month in office until he pledged to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 61-66% by 2035 — The goals submitted by the United States were deemed by the Climate Action Tracker as follows: incompatible In line with the Paris Agreement goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
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The same applies to all other countries that are parties to the agreement. There isn’t one has set emissions reduction targets in line with the Paris Agreement, and the United Nations Environment Program estimated in October last year that this would be possible if countries collectively pledged to reduce emissions. 2.6～3.1℃ Warming is expected (4.7 to 5.6 degrees Fahrenheit) by the end of this century. a May 2024 survey Of the 380 members of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the world’s largest scientific authority on the issue, 77 percent believe humanity is on track for warming of more than 2.5 degrees Celsius by 2100. It turns out.
“Before this administration took office, the global emissions trajectory was already well off track from what the science says is needed,” said Rachel Cleetus, policy director at the nonprofit Union of Concerned Scientists. Ta.
Second, countries have never been forced to comply with the inadequate emissions reduction targets they have submitted under the Paris Agreement. They are only binding if they are binding by national law. And the United States has never passed any legislation that would make the Paris goals binding. Until December, the U.S. NDC was to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50 to 52 percent below 2005 levels by 2030. Many analyzes advocated this goal.within reach” That’s thanks to investments made possible by Biden’s two signature climate bills, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act of 2021 and the Control Inflation Act of 2022. However, as of 2022, U.S. policy will only reduce greenhouse gas emissions by up to 42 percent. This gap will need to be filled by additional actions by states, cities, and private companies.
Meanwhile, the Biden administration Oil and gas extraction increases to record levelsin spite of repeated caveat The International Energy Agency, an independent intergovernmental organization, has reported that no new fossil fuel infrastructure is compatible with a pathway to limiting global warming to 1.5°C.
Sheila Olmsted, a public policy professor at Cornell University, said the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris climate accord is “potentially mostly symbolic.” What ultimately matters is what the Trump administration does domestically, she said. Examples include vehicle emissions standards, greenhouse gas limits for power plants, and clean energy subsidies under the Inflation Control Act. $137 billion Can be used for renewable energy infrastructure and climate change resilience.
Olmsted said it remains to be seen what Trump will be able to accomplish in terms of rolling back these policies, but he has already rolled out a series of measures, including rolling back auto emissions standards and pausing climate spending under the Inflation Control Act. He said he was signing an executive order. Expand oil and gas drilling on federal lands. State and local resistance could at least partially derail the president’s plans. For example, the U.S. Climate Alliance, a coalition of 24 governors whose states account for more than half of the nation’s economy, swear honor The most recent US NDC was submitted during the waning days of the Biden administration.
December anyway Analysis by Rhodium GroupAn independent research firm has found that the deregulatory policies President Trump has begun enacting could increase climate pollution by 24 to 36 percent in 2035 compared to current policies.
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A US withdrawal “threatens to reverse hard-won emissions reduction gains and puts vulnerable countries at greater risk,” Evans-Nywa said in the paper. statement. Mr. Njewa chairs the Least Developed Countries Group in the United Nations climate change negotiations. The group, a bloc of 45 countries including Bangladesh, Ethiopia and Niger, advocates ambitious policies at annual climate change talks.
Most experts are not concerned that the Trump administration will trigger a mass withdrawal from the Paris Agreement. Kaveh Ghirampour, vice president of international strategy at the nonprofit Center for Climate, Energy Solutions, said that other countries are taking longer to prepare, so it will take longer for the US to withdraw from the Paris Agreement than it did during President Trump’s first term. “The impact will be small,” he said.
“I don’t think it’s in the United States’ interest to withdraw from the Paris Agreement,” he said, but said the world “won’t be surprised this time. The world knows what’s going to happen.”
However, there is no precedent for the United States to participate in a climate change conference as a mere observer. The last time President Trump withdrew from the Paris Agreement was in 2017. united nations rules Signatories could not withdraw from the agreement until “three years after the date on which this agreement enters into force.” By the time the United States officially issued a stay-at-home order in 2020, the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic had already ended. Negotiations were postponed until next year. –After Biden took office as President.
This time, there will be no three-year buffer period, and the US will only have one year to leave the Paris Agreement. President Trump may choose not to adhere to even that compressed timeline—the executive order states that the country “withdraws from the agreement and its attendant obligations with immediate effect pursuant to this notification provision. ”—but technically the president still has the power to This year’s negotiation roundscheduled to be held in Brazil in November. Come COP31, the name of the 2026 annual climate conference, the United States will be officially demoted to observer status. They will be able to participate, but they will not have decision-making rights and will not be required to submit new climate change commitments or report on their progress. they.
Without the United States joining the Paris Agreement, climate efforts by other countries, especially those currently in the lead, may be taken less seriously. far-right climate change denier. But Olmstead said that wasn’t actually the case the last time the U.S. announced it was leaving. “It had an evocative quality,” she said, urging Europe and China to reaffirm their commitment to reducing emissions.
Meanwhile, some experts say the structure of the Paris Agreement is at the root of its broader failure to stop global emissions from rising. The bottom-up, spontaneous nature of compacts is often cited as follows: One of its great strengths is And that’s why it has received support from almost every country on earth. But that flexibility clearly becomes problematic if signatories, particularly major polluters like the United States, choose not to pay their fair share.
Olmstead said there are essentially two worldviews when it comes to addressing the climate crisis. It is, as she puts it, “the mother of all collective action problems.” The Paris Agreement calls for an emphasis on equity and cooperation towards common goals. In contrast, the legislation enacted by the Trump administration is more isolationist, requiring “countries to act only in their own interests” and undermining the ability of international organizations to be greater than the sum of their parts. has expressed skepticism.
“It’s unfortunate that that worldview is now being applied to climate change,” Olmsted said, “because it seems incompatible with tackling climate change.”
