The United States has officially rejoined the Paris climate agreement in one of the first major policy reversals undertaken by US President Joe Biden. The move has been hailed by environmental activists and climate campaigners.
The United States had left the Paris climate agreement at the behest of President Donald Trump in 2019, whose administration had championed fossil fuels and contained climate change deniers. While in opposition, Joe Biden had heavily criticised this move by the Trump administration.
The agreement, signed by 200 countries, was established in 2015 and seeks to keep global temperatures below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. This means that each country must set strict goals to reduce their carbon-footprint and their use of fossil fuels. As a result of the agreement, many nations have already implemented vast green-energy schemes.
In his inaugural address, Biden had directly referenced the climate emergency, saying:
"A cry for survival comes from the planet itself. A cry that can't be any more desperate or any more clear now."
In response to the US re-entering the Paris agreement, Christiana Figueres, the former UN climate chief, said there was absolutely no time left to waste and that action was required as soon as possible. She told the UK's Guardian newspaper:
"It's the political message that is being sent. From a political symbolism perspective, whether it's 100 days or four years, it is basically the same thing. It's not about how many days. It's the political symbolism that the largest economy refuses to see the opportunity of addressing climate change. We've lost too much time."
Biden has set ambitious but difficult goals for his presidency, particularly amid the social and economic chaos the US is currently suffering. Among these is a green investment deal that will create clean energy costing around $2 trillion. It is hoped that this investment will mean that the US will achieve a zero-emissions policy by 2050 and a carbon-free power-sector by 2035.
When the Obama administration signed the US up to the climate agreement in 2015, the initial plan was to reduce US carbon emission by 28% by 2025. Biden however, wants to take this even further. This new target, and how to achieve it, will be laid out by the president at the Leaders' Climate Summit in April of this year.
[h/t: Global Citizen]
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