Trump's Withdrawal From Paris Agreement Again Puts US On Wrong Side Of History

Reports abound that Trump will pull the US out of the Paris Climate Agreement. The decision will, in many respects, be largely symbolic because the US can not formally withdraw from the agreement until 2019. But it will allow us to join the esteemed company of Syria and Nicaragua in opposing the agreement and once again illustrate Trump's marching America toward a complete abdication of leadership, moral and otherwise, in the world.

To use the phrasing of the deaf, dumb, and blind Republican members of Congress regarding climate change, I am not a scientist. But I don't think the simple fact that Trump has withdrawn from the agreement is particularly catastrophic. It will surely slow down the already slow progress the world is making toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions and mitigating future global warming.

China and India have already indicated that their efforts will continue regardless of what the United States does. China will reportedly invest $360 billion in renewables over just the next four years. And, as we saw with the solar panel industry, China is only too happy to fill the void when America abdicates its leadership in virtually any field. India, too, has created a blueprint to have nearly 60% of its energy come from renewables within the next ten years. The country has already received commitments of over $22 billion in private investments in renewables and just last week it canceled pre-existing plans to build 14 gigawatts of coal-fired power plants simply because the price of solar power has plummeted and is now significantly cheaper than coal. And in Europe, which has always been a renewables leader, 90% of new energy production is coming from solar and wind.

Even here is the United States. Trump's decision will not significantly slow the inexorable movement toward renewable energy and cheaper natural gas solutions and the resulting shuttering of coal-fired plants. This is largely based on pure cost analyses but also a result of utilities planning for the future they know is coming.

So, while Trump's withdrawal from the Paris Agreement will not change these trends, per se, other actions by the administration certainly would. One example is the report in the NY Times today that the Trump administration is considering removing subsidies for solar and wind power. Currently, government subsidies for wind power come to between $3 billion and $4 billion per year. At times of low energy demand and high production by wind farms, this actually allows the cost of wind energy to fall below zero. The Trump administration is apparently claiming that these subsidies undercut the competition from coal and nuclear power plants. The reality today, however, is that is the cheap cost of natural gas that is largely responsible for the problems in the coal and nuclear energy sector, as opposed to renewables.

The expiration of these subsidies in the past have been devastating for the wind power industry, with new installations falling by over 75% and then picking up again when the subsidies resumed. That may at first blush sound like it would be an unfair subsidy, but it has to be taken in the context of the estimated $20 billion in annual subsidies that go to the US coal, natural gas, and oil industries. Other estimates actually place those subsidies as high as $50 billion.

Rolling back these subsidies for wind and also solar power would actually be a form of protectionism for the ailing coal and nuclear industries. And, more than Trump's Paris decision, it is the decisions and actions that take place in the Energy Department and the EPA that truly would be a setback in attacking global warming. As Paul Krugman keeps on pointing out, the actual costs of really dealing with climate change are much smaller and manageable than most people realize. The fact that Trump is unwilling to bear some of that minimal cost is, to use a word, sad.

Whether or not the Paris Agreement can even do enough to minimize the catastrophic effects of global warming remains to be seen. Certainly the collapsing sea ice in the Arctic, the melting ice sheets in the Antarctic, and the thawing of the tundra is all enough to make one think it is already too late. Whatever effect Trump's decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, he has once again placed the United States on the wrong side of history.