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Policy
The Complicated Relationship Between the U.S. and the Paris Climate Agreement By Niamh Stallings, Masters in International Comparative Law One of the most significant challenges facing the international community in the twenty-first century is global warming. Climate change poses a major threat to the survival of our planet, and its impacts are becoming increasingly more apparent: our summers are experiencing more rainfall, polar ice caps are disappearing, and forest fires frequent arid regions such as Australia and California. These are only a few of the effects of climate change. In 2015, the United Nations established the Paris Agreement to respond to the global threat of climate change by reducing carbon emissions and fossil fuels. The Agreement came into force in 2016 and has since been ratified by 196 countries. The Paris Agreement is an international non-binding agreement of climate change action. By signing up to the Agreement, parties are promising to do their part in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Each country sets its own goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and they are encouraged to be as ambitious as possible. State Parties are afforded flexibility in how they wish to achieve individual climate change goals. The Agreement has a robust system for reporting and collecting targets of the State Parties and requires Parties to declare their targets every five years. In September 2016, former U.S. President Barack Obama used his executive power to sign the Paris Agreement at the end of his presidential term of office, as he was unable to secure congressional approval because his political party was not the majority in either branch of Congress. This unfortunate fact made it relatively easy for his successor, Donald Trump, to withdraw from the Agreement as it was never ratified by Congress. The U.S. withdrawal from the Agreement meant that it was no longer bound to its promise to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and the Trump administration subsequently tampered with or dismantled over 100 national environmental laws. For example, the Trump administration altered how costs of pollution to human health and safety are conducted under the Clean Air Act which weakened government authority to issue clean air and climate change rules. The Impact of U.S. Withdrawal The Paris Agreement fundamentally confirms the direction of international cooperation in responding to climate change. The U.S. withdrawal from the Agreement shocked international governments and environmental non-governmental organisations. Trump’s denial of climate change tarnished the international reputation of the U.S. as a key player in global environmental policy Obama’s administration had committed the US to the Agreement and promised to abide by its terms. Within a year, the U.S. government under the Trump administration turned its back on the Agreement, losing international credibility and standing. The U.S. is the second largest emitter of greenhouse gasses in the world. Remarkably, 10 per cent of the U.S. greenhouse gas emissions is methane. Methane greatly affects the environment in that it warms up the atmosphere. This is a fundamental problem because higher temperatures lead to worse types of disasters such as storms, heat waves, floods and droughts. A warmer climate creates an atmosphere that can gather, retain and drop more water, changing weather patterns in a way that wet regions become wetter and dry regions become dryer. The U.S. climate policy has a strong hold over global climate governance. The failure of the U.S. to adequately regulate greenhouse gases will have devastating effects at a global level. Therefore, combatting climate change must be a global effort.
