The incoming president is expected to yank the US out of the Paris Agreement, slash climate finance and wage war on science – but clean energy may get an easier ride
With Donald Trump, a notorious climate change sceptic, poised to enter the White House for a second term, the climate world – from officials to campaigners and business executives – is bracing for the impact of his presidency.
Trump, a Republican business mogul who has called climate change a “scam”, has made no secret about his intentions. From plans to withdraw the US from the Paris Agreement once more, to attacks on the scientific research underpinning our knowledge of global warming and the roll-back of key emission-cutting regulations, the incoming administration could mark a major setback for climate action.
Experts believe one of Trump’s first moves after being sworn in on January 20 could be to pull the US out of the landmark global climate agreement. If he takes that step – something he did last time around – the US would join just three other countries outside the Paris Agreement: Iran, Libya and Yemen.
Legal experts say Trump could quit Paris pact – but leaving UNFCCC much harder
The process to leave would take a year from the time Trump triggers it, meaning that the US will still be part of the Paris Agreement when the COP30 climate talks take place in Brazil in November.
Trump’s team is also reportedly mulling a more audacious attempt to pull the US out of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the instrument underpinning global climate action, for the first time. While leaving the Paris pact would be legally straightforward, experts are divided on whether Trump could withdraw the US from the UNFCCC without Senate approval and – if he did – how easy it would be for a future president to re-join.
Frances Colón, lead for international climate policy at the Center for American Progress, told journalists this week that Washington’s role at COP30 is “not clear”. “Diplomats will do their best, but they’ll have to see whether the White House will be interested at all in engaging in COP talks, and this is still an open question,” she said.
Leaving the Paris pact would mean the US would no longer have to report on its greenhouse gas emissions each year and would have weaker legal responsibilities to provide climate finance for developing countries to adopt clean energy and adapt to a warming world.
Developing-world climate dollars at risk
Joe Thwaites, senior advocate for international climate finance with the US-based Natural Resources Defense Council, said Trump’s administration is expected to try to cut back on international climate finance provision everywhere it can – but that doesn’t mean funding will fall to zero.
Early in his first term in 2017, when Trump announced that the US would leave the Paris Agreement,