Op-Ed: Climate action under Trump

There is a lot of speculation as to what President-elect Donald Trump will do on the issues surrounding climate change. Trump’s most infamous verbiage on the subject is that the Chinese government made up the concept of climate change so that U.S. manufacturing would be less competitive. For years, Trump has played an incredulous weatherman on Twitter, sharing the freezing weather conditions around the world and sarcastically implicating global warming. On his website, he states his intent to withdraw the United States' role in the Paris Agreement and lift regulations, which would allow $50 trillion worth of oil and gas reserves on federal land to be tapped into. His nominee to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) transition, Myron Ebell, is an unapologetic climate change skeptic and ominous leader.

The future of our planet doesn’t look good under a Trump administration, and we are likely to see regression rather than progression in climate change policy. Whereas President Barack Obama has prioritized the fight against climate change, Trump intends to undo restrictions and regulations that would protect our environment but harm industry. An example would be the Clean Power Plan, a provision supported by Obama in which the EPA set emissions regulations on fossil fuel-powered plants. The aim is to reduce carbon pollution and require cleaner and more efficient plants. The Clean Power Plan is currently under judicial review, and the fate of its implementation can be manipulated by Trump through his appointment to fill an empty Supreme Court seat. It is unlikely that Trump will take bold actions against climate change, but it is in areas of enforcement, regulation, funding and new proposals that progress on environmental issues will suffer.

Similarly, Trump has talked about "cancelling" U.S. involvement in the Paris Agreement. To do so by bypassing the four-year waiting period to withdraw, Trump would have to withdraw from the overarching UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, signed by President George H.W. Bush in 1992. This would have largely negative political reverberations and set the United States on a path of reckless endangerment and non-cooperation with other nations to take responsibility for their global emissions. Because of these considerations, it is unlikely that such a bold move would be taken; however, the United States' role in curbing global emissions could be seriously undermined by Trump's relaxed enforcement policies and his promise to open up $50 trillion worth of oil and gas reserves.

Atrophying American leadership in the race against climate change has implications beyond our 50 states. As the world’s second largest greenhouse gas emitter after China — which itself has been making tremendous progress in cleaning up emissions and innovating in the alternative energy sector — we, the United States of America, have a responsibility to clean up this planet, which is not only our home but also the home of many others.

A major reason some poorer countries signed the Paris Agreement was the $861 million in aid the United States promised to send overseas for clean energy development and climate change mitigation tasks. Trump said he would cease payment to the UN’s global warming programs, which would strip poorer dependent countries of vital funds we owe them. Here lies an example of how the entitlement and privilege of one man could result in our rich country looking the other way as poorer nations try and fail to clean up a mess we contributed to.

But in a recent interview with the New York Times, Trump revealed he has an open mind and is taking a closer look at climate change. He even admitted to there being some connectivity between human activity and climate change. However, staying true to his commitment to growing America’s economy and revitalizing the manufacturing industry, Trump said the extent of the connectivity between humans and climate change “depends on how much it’s going to cost our companies.”He proceeded to talk about the noncompetitive position of the United States relative to other countries, citing the decline of thousands of factories. That the president-elect of the United States said the partial extent to which climate change can be attributed to humans depends on how much it will hurt business reminds me of the profit-driven populist he is. Under a Trump presidency, we can expect the regular omission of inconvenient facts that could change this country and our planet forever.

Regardless of how our president-elect chooses to act, the doubt he casts on the urgency of climate change renders it undeniable that there is a moral responsibility for universities to do everything they can to act on this crisis. It is up to us — students, faculty, staff, administrators and the university body as a whole — to leverage our position as leaders and pioneers in society by opening major dialogue about climate change and our role in causing and confronting it.

If you too feel a responsibility to act, consider joining Tufts Climate Action. Tufts Climate Action brings awareness to issues of climate change and climate justice. We engage with the student body and administration to call on Tufts to divest from fossil fuels, thereby aligning the endowment with university values and refusing to profit from the destruction of our planet. As the political climate becomes more uncertain, it is even more important for us to act and have our voices heard. New members are always welcome to our weekly Monday meetings at 8:30 p.m. in Eaton 207 and are encouraged to message our Facebook page for further details. Lead with us in the fight for a just climate!

 

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