The election of Donald J. Trump to a second term as President of the United States is a major blow to the human race’s attempt to deal with the challenge of living on a relentlessly warming planet.
It is now eight years since the Paris Agreement on climate change was signed, an undertaking to address mitigation — reducing the impacts of temperature rise — and adaptation — dealing with those impacts, and finance — helping the responses of developing countries.
The agreed target was to keep temperature increases to well below 2°C this century, and hopefully to 1.5°C. One hundred and ninety-five countries, including New Zealand, signed up to the Paris Agreement and developed ‘‘national determined contributions’’ (NDCs) to show how they would reach these targets.
Unfortunately, most countries’ contributions have been set too low, and implementing them has been very slow, and as a result carbon emissions have increased. We have already reached the 1.5°C target and are on course for a 3°C rise by the end of the century.
Indeed, unless more committed action is undertaken urgently it will be difficult to hold to that target. One of the most alarming features of the current temperature increase is that we are approaching tipping points in the Arctic and the tropical rainforests, which means that no matter what we do the temperature increase cannot be stopped. Anything over a 3°C rise spells serious danger to our survival. This is why action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is an imperative now.
The US is the second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases; China is the first, and it is taking significant steps to reduce its emissions. Its target is to achieve carbon neutrality before 2060. Under President Biden the US committed to reducing emissions by 50% by 2030. These steps are the absolute minimum necessary to keep climate change under control. Hopefully, they will be enough, especially if the minor players (including New Zealand) also play their part.
But everything has now changed. Trump’s election means an about-turn in America’s response to climate change. Donald J. Trump is a climate change denier. In his first term he withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement, criticised climate scientists’ reports as fake news and increased fossil fuel production. He has promised to do it again. In the speech in which he claimed election victory he proclaimed his enthusiastic support for the oil industry, calling it ‘‘liquid gold’’.
Behind Trump’s presidency lies Project 2025, a blueprint for Trump’s administration written by the neoconservative Heritage Foundation. It calls for a ‘‘wholesale unwinding’’ of current US policy and action on climate change, and for the US to step back from international engagement in this area. Project 2025 also plans the replacement of government experts with political appointees loyal to the president, which would effectively mean the closing down of all government-led climate change research and initiatives. We can only suppose that the authors of Project 2025 have no grandchildren who, if the Project is implemented, could well find themselves in an uninhabitable world.
There’s no doubt that many industry leaders have recognised that a future based on sustainable energy rather than fossil fuels has huge economic potential, especially in the US where Biden’s oddly named Inflation Reduction Act provided significant incentives. Trump is highly likely to scale back Biden’s initiatives.
In short, President Trump’s second administration means the future of our species, and other species on Earth, is in even greater jeopardy than before. It is a matter of astonishment that this was almost completely ignored in the election campaign, probably because (as in our own country) awareness of the climate threat is parked in the ‘‘too uncomfortable’’ basket and therefore politicians don’t see it as a vote winner.
However, the US withdrawal from combatting climate change — its likely role lies more in increasing temperature rise — places more of a burden on the rest. If the US isn’t going to save the world, the rest of will have to, including New Zealand. New NDCs are required next year from all Paris signatories, and the US may not even provide one.
This is the opportunity for our government to respond to the new, even more serious international climate emergency created by Trump’s election. Significant mitigation steps, abandoned by the coalition government, will need to be re-introduced. Adaptation measures will need to be enhanced. Funding to help our friends in the Pacific will need to be increased.
Will our coalition government do any of this, or will its own climate deniers prevail? Will its focus on doing things on the cheap (sorry, ‘‘exercising fiscal responsibility’’) mean it steps back from what is necessary to sustain life on this planet?
That’s up to us. A recent survey report from the New Zealand Election Study reveals that half of us recognise the importance of responding to the climate emergency. This is more than ever. We need to speak out.
When people become politicians, they tend to focus on holding power, which means they are suddenly only to be able to think in three-year terms. The rest of us can think in the longer term, and so can politicians if they start to think in terms of service rather than power.
What our children and grandchildren here and across the planet desperately need now is for government decision-makers to think about preventing the planet from becoming progressively more uninhabitable over the next decades — and that means taking much more serious action now. Not to do so would be irresponsible.
It may be hard, but they can always blame Trump.
■ John Drummond is an emeritus professor at the University of Otago.
