The US elections are less than a week away, presidential candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris they vote within two points of each other and the race remains on a knife edge.
Harris is expected to continue the incumbent’s climate policy president joe bidenTrump is likely to take steps to repeal green legislation introduced by his predecessor and increase investment in fossil fuels.
Somewhere at some point climate crisis is rising fast, here’s what you need to know about Trump’s environmental policy.
Republicans are the ‘anti-climate party’
Dr Jared Finnegan, a graduate director of climate change policy and politics at University College London, told Yahoo News that the Republican party has been skeptical of climate change since the early 1990s.
“Since then, it’s gotten more intense,” he said. “They’ve always been kind of an anti-climate party.”
The climate debate is considered an “extremely divisive issue” in the United States. “It’s very polarizing,” he said.
The Republican manifesto has nothing to do with the environment, other than increasing domestic US energy.
“Increasing internal energy means increasing fossil fuels. This means reducing roads, subsidies and regulations to increase oil and gas production in the United States,” Finnegan said.
Katie Pruszynski, Trump expert and PhD candidate in the Department of Politics and International Relations University of Sheffieldreflects this.
“The Republican party is in favor of increasing domestic oil, gas and coal production — all the things we’ve been trying to stop ourselves for decades,” he told Yahoo News.
One factor behind that decision, Finnegan believes, is down to Republican donors.
“The Republican party receives huge contributions from oil and gas and polluting industries. Trump? I don’t know if he has an ideology or not,” he said.
Electing Joe Biden’s climate legacy
Presenting a series of ambitious climate packages has been a point of pride for current President Biden.
Part of that climate and energy legacy was the $391bn (£301bn) Inflation Reduction Act, part of which invested in clean domestic energy production and set up battery factories for electric car makers in industrial cities.
However, Trump warned that these measures would come first.
“The party’s platform cuts and gets rid of Biden’s climate change policies. Trump himself goes further,” said Finnegan.
“If Trump decides to completely repeal the Inflation Reduction Act, it will pretty much get rid of everything when it comes to US climate change.”
But repealing the legislation would be extremely difficult. Over time, the movement is more likely to weaken and fall.
According to Andy Garraway, a former UK cabinet adviser to former energy secretary Alok Sharma and head of climate policy at sustainability intelligence firm Resilience, the law is very popular even among Trump’s casual voter base.
“One of the really smart things that Biden was able to do as part of the De-Inflation Act was really focus on climate job growth in industrial areas — areas that saw jobs being lost from the green transition,” Garraway told Yahoo News. .
So repealing it could mean Trump has a fight on his hands.
“The reason for the creation of those jobs is not taken into account. They don’t really care that there’s a climate bill that provides that funding,” Garraway said.
The Paris Agreement
Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement during his first term of office caused shockwaves around the world.
The international climate change agreement, signed by 196 countries, aims to keep the global temperature rise this century to well below 2C above pre-industrial levels, ideally to 1.5C.
Above this temperature rise, experts warn, the world could plunge into economic, ecological and social collapse, with extreme weather becoming the norm, widespread crop failures leading to famine and rising sea levels eroding coastlines.
On January 20, 2021—his first day in office—Biden returned the United States to the Paris Agreement.
But in November, the spokesperson of the Trump campaign said Politics he said that if he returns to power, he will withdraw from the contract again.
“If Trump wants to pull out of the Paris agreement again and try to blow up the negotiation process, they could do it in a number of ways and create a headache for other developed countries,” Finnegan said. “High-income countries tend to negotiate as a bloc.
The results could have consequences for other major powers, which are under pressure to reduce their emissions.
“If America doesn’t stick to its climate goals, you’re going to have countries like China, potentially India, saying, ‘If they don’t stick to their climate goals, we’re not going to stick to our climate goals now.’ Pruszinski said.
Finnegan added: “Unless Trump cuts emissions, climate change will ultimately be worse for all of us.”
Without US participation at COP30 – the first climate conference where each country must come back and submit an updated Nationally Determined Contribution and raise the level of ambition to reduce emissions – the absence of US participation could be extremely damaging.
As the US currently accounts for about 15% of global greenhouse gas emissions, it is a key player in limiting the damage of the climate crisis.
“The US still plays such an important role in any kind of international negotiations. I think it’s also a good opportunity for the United States to hear voices that aren’t usually heard in these kinds of conversations,” Garraway said.
“Small island states are given equal weight, at least on paper, in terms of opportunities to speak to those directly affected.
“To hear someone tell you that their house will be under water in 20 years is a very powerful and moving thing.”
Increasing emissions
While Trump may want to invest in fossil fuels and turn his back on the global climate agenda, Garraway cautions that the realities of climate change are already felt and public mandates may have some effect.
“Just the other day, the United States was hit with Hurricane Helene, which is being made worse by climate change,” he said.
“Climate disasters like this affect states that vote predominantly Republican, like Florida. They see the impact on their doorstep. Whether they accept science from the root or not, their houses are flooded.”
Finnegan believes that if Trump wins, progress on climate will be surrounded by “more delays and more obstacles.”
“The progress we’ve made over the last few years, the clock is turning back again,” he said. “U.S. emissions are unlikely to increase, just rapidly decline.
While Trump may not double U.S. emissions in four years, Finnegan warns that it is important that he actively reduce them.
“I think it makes the policy process more difficult, so it takes another ten years to start things up again. And we don’t have that time.”
That being said, there are other market forces.
“We are not going to build new coal-fired power plants in the United States. It is simply not economically feasible. Solar and wind are also becoming cheaper. So even without the policy, you get this drip, drip, drip,” he said.
“But it’s not fast enough.”