Trump’s quixotic energy policy

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MADRID – April 22, 2017 – International Earth Day – marks one year since the signing of the Paris climate agreement, which entered into force last November, and now has 195 signatories. That landmark multilateral treaty still represents the most important step forward to date in the global fight against climate change. But its first anniversary has been darkened by US President Donald Trump’s energy policies.

In 2016, the hottest year on record, average global temperatures were 0.9º C above the twentieth-century average. The Paris agreement’s main objective is to prevent average world temperatures from rising more than 2º C above pre-industrial levels by 2100. Notably, developing countries such as China and India – the world’s largest and third-largest greenhouse-gas producers, respectively – have committed themselves to reaching this goal.

The Paris agreement established a revolutionary new framework for such commitments: the “Nationally Determined Contributions”. Each signatory country outlines in its NDC its voluntary contribution toward the common global goal of mitigating the impact of anthropogenic climate change.

After suggesting during the presidential campaign that he would “cancel” the Paris agreement, Trump later claimed to be keeping “an open mind” about it. But while the world waits to see what he decides, his administration has issued a budget blueprint that is hardly in line with the spirit of the accord.

Trump is proposing to eliminate federal funding for scientific research on climate change, and to slash the Environmental Protection Agency’s budget by nearly a third. As if that were not enough, he recently issued an executive order instructing government agencies to roll back the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, which was designed to limit emissions from coal-fired power plants, and promote renewable energies. “My administration is putting an end to the war on coal,” Trump declared while signing the order.

Trump went on to promise that he would deliver “clean coal, really clean coal.” But “clean coal” ...

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