U.S’ Official Exit From Paris Climate Agreement

The United States has officially withdrawn from the Paris Agreement but for how long? That depends on who becomes the next President.

The exit

Three years ago, in June 2017, President Donald Trump had announced his move to pull out from the Paris Climate Agreement. And after three years, it has become the first major nation to formally withdraw from the agreement. The member state has to serve a 12-month notice period on the United Nations. The Trump Administration had formally served the notice to the UN a year ago.

Trump announced the withdrawal reasoning it to being unfair to the United States and argued that it would undermine the U.S. economy. During his speech in the White House in June 2017, he stated that the Paris Climate Accord disadvantages the United States to the exclusive benefit of other countries.

U.S. withdrawing from such an agreement may act as a gap in the global effort as the country is said to be the second largest green-house gas emitter in the world, therefore it needs to reduce its share of domestic emissions. Also, it acts as one of the major economies to provide the required source of finance.

About the agreement

• The Paris Agreement, adopted on 12 December 2015 in Paris aims to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change by keeping the global temperature rise this century well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
• The Agreement calls on countries to combat climate change and to accelerate and intensify the actions and investments needed for a sustainable low carbon future, and to adapt to the increasing impacts of climate change.
• It also expects rich countries to help poorer nations by providing ‘climate finance’ to adapt to climate change and switch to renewable energy and encourages other countries to join in on a voluntary basis.
• It requires all Parties to report regularly on their emissions and on their implementation efforts. There will also be a global stocktake every 5 years to assess the collective progress towards achieving the purpose of the agreement and to inform further individual actions by Parties.

Possibility to rejoin

If Trump wins re-election, as he has stated earlier, he would start negotiations to re-enter only on terms that are fair to the United States.

On the other hand, Joe Biden during his campaign trail has ensured to seek to re-join the Paris agreement as soon as possible if he’s elected. For that, all that is required is a month’s notice to re-join.

Soon after the official news of withdrawal from the agreement on November 4, Joe Biden tweeted that — “Today, the Trump Administration officially left the Paris Climate Agreement. And in exactly 77 days, a Biden Administration will rejoin it.”

The possibility of the United States to re-join the Paris Agreement will only depend on the outcome of the U.S. election contest and who takes charge of the White House.

Head to moneyguru’s Insight section to stay updated on all major financial news updates of the day!