What Does The Withdrawal Of The Us From The Paris Agreement Mean For Climate Change?

On 22 April 2016, in an attempt to prevent global temperatures from raising to 2°C above pre-industrial levels, the world’s largest emitters of greenhouse gases banded together to strike the Paris Agreement.

It was a shining example of global cooperation, that is, until US president Donald Trump indicated in June that the US will be pulling out.

If all countries implemented their commitments under the agreement, global greenhouse gas emissions would peak over the coming decade before returning to close to their current level in 2030. Global temperatures would still be rising, but at a constant rather than an exponentially increasing rate if nothing were to be done. Crucially, the agreement accepts that to stop the warming, net global emissions need to be reduced to zero. It also sets up a mechanism for progressively more ambitious reductions through a periodic ‘stock take’, with the first scheduled to be completed in 2023. Right now, the US accounts for about 12 per cent of global emissions, but if other countries cut back while the US keeps its carbon footprint stomping along at a steady ‘business as usual’ clip, then that fraction will rise. The result: we will never reduce emissions to zero, and temperatures will keep rising.