Leading up to the 2024 presidential election, both Harris and Trump highlighted many issues, but neither chose to focus that much on climate change. Despite its erasure, it’s still a foremost concern for many Americans, especially as it leads to hotter temperatures, more severe storms, and decreasing resources. With Donald Trump as the president-elect, many are concerned about what his environmental plan is, especially as the 2030 climate goals presented by the United Nations approach. However, his track record on environmental policy leaves much to be desired, and likely won’t be sufficient to address climate change and reach these 2030 goals.
The United Nations has outlined climate action as one of its top priorities and sustainable development goals, and has suggested plans for its member countries to follow to prevent more than 1.5°C of global warming. Most notably among these plans is a 45% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, which the United States pledged to meet in the Paris Agreement. This highlights the first concern with a second Trump administration and climate change: he has pledged to leave these accords, which takes away a major financial resource from global climate action. Though this action is largely symbolic, it indicates that Trump cares very little about climate change, and sets the tone for his presidency on this issue.
Trump has also called for significant cutbacks to environmental policies within the United States. Throughout his campaign, he has promised to remove restrictions on oil and gas production, end electric vehicle subsidies, and reduce clean energy production, especially wind and solar. Even now, the US is not dedicating sufficient funds and policies to reach the necessary climate goals to prevent long-term environmental harm. As the Climate Action Tracker describes, if the US were to continue its environmental policies as they are currently, including the policy changes from the Inflation Reduction Act, it would still be 23%–37% below necessary carbon emission reduction targets to prevent catastrophic warning. This projection is likely to become even more pessimistic if Trump were to enact his promised policies.
Not to be disregarded is Trump’s social impact on how Americans perceive climate change. He has repeatedly downplayed the effects of or even denied climate change; in one of his rallies after Hurricane Helene, he called it “one of the great scams of all time.” Despite overwhelming scientific evidence that it is not only real, but actively exacerbating natural disasters, including the aforementioned hurricane. The annual global temperature has already been raised by 1°C since the Industrial Revolution, and 2023 was the hottest year on record since 1850. However, 16% of Americans still do not believe in climate change. If the president of the United States, one of the most listened-to voices in the country, continues to deny the inalienable truth of climate change, scientists and activists will only face further opposition to their work.
Climate change is an incredibly real issue, and one that must be addressed soon to prevent catastrophic damage to the Earth. Though policies put in place during the Biden administration may be hard to reverse, Trump’s plans to prevent future climate action may have disastrous results. Hopefully, enough pressure will be put on his administration and Congress to prevent total rollback of climate protection, but unless Trump completely flips his promises around climate change, the next four years are likely to cause deep harm to the environment.
Sources:
www.cnbc.com/2024/11/06/trumps-election-victory-sparks-dismay-among-climate-community.html
www.un.org/en/climatechange/science/causes-effects-climate-change
www.un.org/en/climatechange/net-zero-coalition
www.nrdc.org/stories/global-warming-101#warming
www.conservation.org/stories/climate-change-facts
climatecommunication.yale.edu/visualizations-data/ycom-us/
www.brookings.edu/articles/trump-has-big-plans-for-climate-and-energy-policy-but-can-he-implement-them/
climateactiontracker.org/countries/usa/
planetdetroit.org/2024/11/trump-climate-policy-impact/
