The U.S. credibility chasm on climate change
Kelly Sims Gallagher explains how trust was broken when the United States left the Paris Agreement under the Trump Administration, and predicts that the restoration of faith may not be an easy feat.
The biggest hurdle for President Biden in winning new emissions reduction commitments at this week's White House summit is America's on-again, off-again history of climate change efforts.
Why it matters: The global community is off course to meet the temperature targets contained in the Paris Climate Agreement. The White House wants the summit Thursday and Friday to begin to change that.
- The Paris agreement called for warming to be limited to "well below 2 degrees" Celsius, or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, relative to preindustrial levels.
- However, the world is currently on course for 3 degrees Celsius, or 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit, of warming, which raises the odds of potentially disastrous consequences.
The big picture: The U.S. has been playing a game of "red light, green light" on climate change for decades. The country played a leading role in brokering the Kyoto Protocol in 1995, but walked away from that agreement in 2001.
- Then the U.S. helped spearhead talks on the Paris agreement during Barack Obama's presidency, only to leave that agreement under Donald Trump and rejoin when Biden took office.
- Considering this timeline, other countries — including China, which is by far the world's top emitter today — question the word of the Biden administration when it says the U.S. is fully committed to climate action.
- Some Chinese leaders have recently signaled they don't see the U.S. as being in a strong position to prod it to cut emissions after walking away from Paris.
- For example, on Friday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said of the U.S. return to the Paris agreement: "Its return is by no means a glorious comeback but rather the student playing truant getting back to class."