Trump’s order does not reverse laws in 29 states that promote clean energy instead of coal.
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And, as many have noted, even the elimination of the Clean Power Plan will not itself bring coal back to anything like its former life. Both were enacted under the Obama administration, though the CPP’s implementation was stayed by a federal court.
The historic global climate deal has been a top target of Trump, who appears hell-bent on dismantling his predecessor’s legacy.
“Come on, fellas”, Trump said. You know what it says, right? “We regret the fact that the president is trying to dial back history, but it’s not going to happen”. “Texas is once again experiencing an energy boom – this time, with wind power”.
Although welcomed by the oil and coal industries, environmental experts have been quick to condemn the move.
Still, for the President, the order appears to fulfill campaign promises to put coal miners back to work.
“There is a clear risk that the United States might go beyond the delicate balance that the countries agreed in Paris”, said Li Shuo, senior climate adviser with environmental group Greenpeace.
Yeatman also points out that the Clean Power Plan was already in limbo after the U.S. Supreme Court took the “unprecedented step of pausing the rule” while litigation worked its way through the federal courts.
Yesterday’s executive order meant to promote “energy independence and economic growth” is being viewed as an action that will roll back key elements of the U.S. climate strategy, reversing some of the policies and initiatives started by former President Barack Obama’s administration.
“One of his major scientific contributions in recent years has been to proclaim that climate change is a hoax”, Mr Sanders said at a rally in February 2016.
In the March 22 letter the official from the energy giant, which now is under investigation for its accounting practices related to climate change, argued that the Paris Agreement presents an opportunity to support greater use of natural gas. We need jobs on the Western Slope. Mark Lynas, a British author, journalist, and environmental activist who focuses on climate change worries that “The rest of the world will be asked to cover for the U.S. falling behind”. But it’s simply unlikely Trump’s actions will lead to more of them. That poll, which also found most Americans are willing to pay a little more each month to fight global warming, was conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago. First, cheap gas from fracking undercut the coal price, and then even solar power got cheaper than coal.
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If that’s true, President Trump’s actions deserve scrutiny and those leading the charge on climate action should not be deterred.
