The United States officially returned to the Paris Global Climate Agreement on Friday, and U.S. leaders said the nation could never afford to put aside the growing climate crisis.
“Climate change and scientific diplomacy can never again be ‘complements’ in our discussions on foreign policy,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement, which was expected to be a day of publicity. the Biden administration to the global and national hearing on the U.S. commitment to reducing emissions of climate-damaging fossil fuels.
“Addressing the real threats of climate change and listening to our scientists is at the heart of our domestic and foreign policy priorities,” Blinken said. “It is vital in our discussions on national security, migration, international health efforts and in our economic diplomacies and trade talks.”
Officially, the withdrawal of President Donald Trump’s nation from the global climate pact it was only 107 days. It was part of Trump’s withdrawal from global allegiances in general and his often asserted but false view. that the ongoing global warming was a mistakenly taken by scientists around the world.
While Friday’s return is highly symbolic, world leaders say they expect America to show its seriousness after four years of being virtually absent. They especially anticipate an announcement by the United States in the coming months about its goal of reducing emissions of heat-capturing gases by 2030.
The US returns to the Paris agreement became official Friday, nearly a month after President Joe Biden told the United Nations the United States wants to return. “The cry for survival comes from the planet itself,” Biden said in his inaugural speech. “A cry that now cannot be more desperate or clearer.”
Biden signed an executive order the first day in office that reversed the withdrawal ordered by Trump. The Trump administration had announced his retirement of the Paris agreement in 2019, but did not take effect until November 4, 2020, the day after the election, due to the provisions of the agreement.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Thursday that the official re-entry of the United States “is very important”, as well as Biden’s announcement that the US will again provide climate aid to the poorest nations, such as was promised in 2009.
“It’s the political message that is being sent,” said Christiana Figueres, the former United Nations climate chief. It was one of the main forces in reaching the mostly voluntary 2015 agreement in which nations set their own targets for reducing greenhouse gases.
One fear was that other nations would continue America abandoning the climate struggle, but none did, Figueres said. He said the real problem was four years of climate inaction by the Trump administration. U.S. cities, states, and companies still worked to reduce carbon dioxide that traps heat, but without the federal government.
“From a political symbolism perspective, whether it’s 100 days or four years, it’s basically the same,” Figueres said. “It’s not about how many days. It is the political symbolism that the largest economy refuses to see the opportunity to address climate change.
“We’ve wasted too much time,” Figueres said.
The director of the United Nations Environment Program, Inger Andersen, said America must show its leadership to the rest of the world, but said she has no doubt that it will do so when it presents the goals needed to reduce emissions. . The Biden administration promises to announce them before an Earth Day summit in April.
“We hope that they translate into a very significant reduction in emissions and are an example for other countries,” Guterres said. Already more than 120 countries, including China’s No. 1 broadcaster, have pledged to have net carbon emissions by the middle of the century.
University of Maryland environment professor Nate Hultman, who worked on the Obama administration’s official Paris target, said he expects a goal for 2030 to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 40 % and 50% with respect to the basal levels of 2005.
Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, the top Republican in the Senate energy group, has criticized Biden for meeting again in Paris, tweeting: “Returning to the Paris climate deal will increase Americans’ energy costs and it will not solve climate change. The Biden administration will set unfeasible targets for the United States, while China and Russia will be able to continue their usual business. ”
A long-term international goal, included in the Paris agreement with an even stricter target, is to keep warming below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) since pre-industrial times. The world has already warmed 1.2 degrees Celsius (2.2 degrees Fahrenheit) since then.
The United States, which is rejoining the Paris agreement and reaching an ambitious target of emission cuts, will cause the limitation of “warming” to much less than 2 degrees (not just 2 degrees, but less than 2 degrees) is much more likely, ”said Zeke Hausfather, a climate scientist and climate director at the Breakthrough Institute.
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Associated Press writer Matthew Daly contributed to this report.
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Read stories about climate issues from The Associated Press at https://apnews.com/hub/climate.
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Follow Seth Borenstein on Twitter at @borenbears.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department is supported by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.