President Donald Trump has taken the US out of the Paris Climate Pact of 2015. The past US commitment has been cast to the winds. More than 190 countries had agreed to reduce greenhouse gas emission and restrict the rise in global average temperature to below 2 degree c. above pre-industrial levels. The Obama administration had shown exemplary compliance. Trump is going back on it presumably in his mission to protect American jobs. The US president is short-sighted and does not care if the US uses its global leadership. He says the Paris accord is discriminatory. He has put India at a disadvantage. He has alleged that the accord allows India to double its coal production by 2020 and camouflage mitigation efforts with billions of dollars in aid. The charge is baseless wit falling prices of renewables like solar power, India is losing interest in coal plants. India is also committed to achieve 40% cumulative electric power installed capacity from non-fossil fuel resources by 2020.
According to the 2013 data, per capital CO2 emission in the US was 16.4 metric tonnes. India’s figure was only 1.6 metric tonnes. The US is the world’s biggest polluter next to poverty. The mitigation equivalence is inapplicable as the industrial base line has never been the same. Current per capital emissions also show wide disparities. Climate change has its worst victims in poor countries. From Rio to Cancun, the US has been the stumbling block to a consensus. What John Kerry did has now been undone. Trump is handing over leadership to China!
