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May 28th, 2017
As Trump wraps up his first overseas trip as the president of the USA, besides the awkward handshakes and shoving of NATO leader, the most evident reason for animosity from foreign leaders would be Trump being the only leader amongst the G7 summit who refuse to promise to abide by the Paris Climate Change Agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emission. Though this outcome does not really come as a surprise, given Trump’s notorious track record in his disbelief of climate change throughout his campaign, it is still worth the discussion as the repercussion of a potential withdrawal from climate deal could have a massive ripple effect that affects not only USA, but the international scene of environmental protection effort. Given the grave outlook of this presidential decision, the following discussion would focus on analyzing the importance of the Paris Agreement, Trump’s ability to interfere with the agreement, and the future outlook should Trump really pulls out from this international accord.
Paris Agreement, which was negotiated at the annual United Nations Climate Change Conferences late 2015 and came into effect by late 2016, is recognized as a monumental step for addressing climate change and setting a path for the coming decade in reducing greenhouse gas emission. What separates the COP21 from previous Climate Change “Conference of the Parties” (COP) since the mid-90s, is that 195 countries (almost every country in the world, including USA who avoided the 1997 Kyoto Protocol altogether) has come to a consensus to tackle climate change together. Furthermore, unlike previous COPs which countries just come together to list their shortcomings, Paris’ COP21 allows each country to set its own goals for limiting or slowing carbon emissions, fighting deforestation, maintaining transparency on climate issues, and identifying the adverse effects of climate change. Every country submitted a set of goals, called Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs), striving to keep the Earth from reaching the 2°C increase in global temperature. USA’s INDC in particular is to reduce carbon emissions by 26% from the levels measured in 2005. In short, COP21 guarantees each nation has its own reachable goals, and is the first time that almost 200 countries recognise publicly that lowering carbon emissions to curb climate change is important.
Donald Trump, on the other hand, has claimed on several occasions that climate change is a hoax created by China, is now the leader of USA, a country with the second highest carbon emission in the world. During his election campaign, he has promised to cancel or renegotiate the Paris Agreement, so it does not come as much of a surprise for him to not promise to abide to the agreement during the G7 meeting. However, he does not have the authority to simply “cancel” the agreement, as it is an agreement signed by more than 190 countries, and neither can he withdraw USA from the agreement immediately as it would be a process that takes more than three years. He does, however, has the power to ignore it, as like most UN drafted agreements, the Paris Agreement does not hold countries to legal obligations, but social responsibilities. Given Trump’s view on the matter and his demeanor on such issues, the possibility of him ignoring the agreement altogether is indisputable. He has signed an executive order back in March as an attempt to rollback President Obama’s Clean Power Plan, and can very well eliminate it altogether by simply directing the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which is headed by Scott Pruitt, who allowed his governed state, Oklahoma, to experience an increase of earthquakes of 3.0 magnitude from 2 in 2008, to 889 in 2016 due to fracking, a method of extracting natural gas by injecting water, sand and chemicals into the ground. Therefore despite Trump’s inability to directly hinder global combat against climate change, he is fully capable of doing so on a national level, and given USA’s global status, it is inevitable that Trump’s climate decisions would affect the world’s joined-attempt in slowing global carbon emission, as other countries would definitely be unhappy about USA being uncooperative, which might even lead to a contagion effect of countries withdrawing from the agreement.
Nonetheless, should Donald Trump really elect to withdraw USA from the Paris Agreement, the global outlook on curbing climate change is still tilted toward the optimistic side as the majority of the components are still out of his control. To begin with, it is more likely that other countries would continue to abide to their promises in terms of the Paris Agreement despite USA’s withdrawal, as most countries are largely sensible and responsible (at least politically), and that would eventually build up scrutiny towards the Trump administration. Meanwhile, stateside, he and the EPA would face the litigation from environmental groups if he opt to eliminate Obama’s Clean Power Plan, and in terms of legislation, it would be a long winding process and certainly not something he is going to be able to do so in the short term. Furthermore, market trends have shown a reduction in coal power and greenhouse gas emission, as companies shift their business strategies in terms of energy consumption, due to the international compliance towards the Paris Agreement, which is something that is outside the realm of USA’s regulation and Trump’s control. In conclusion, however oblivious or irresponsible Trump and his administration are towards climate change (which he clearly is not unaware of, as he filed a permit to build a seawall in 2010, to protect his golf course in Ireland, the reason he cited was literally ‘Climate change and its effect’), the Paris Agreement still stands a great chance in coming out triumphant eventually, as the rest of the world behave like actual adults and help mitigate human effect on climate change as a whole.
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