United States President Joe Biden speaks to the press prior to a meeting with the Hispanic Caucus of Congress in the Oval Office of the White House on April 20, 2021 in Washington, DC. – President Joe Biden Tuesday called for the “correct” verdict in the trial of the ex-cop accused of murdering George Floyd, calling the evidence “overwhelming”. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski / AFP) (Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI / AFP via Getty Images)
BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI | AFP | Getty Images
President Joe Biden pledges to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 50% to 52% by 2030. This is the government’s latest push to aggressively combat climate change, the White House said on Thursday.
The target more than doubled the country’s previous commitment to the 2015 Paris Agreement when the Obama administration planned to cut emissions by 26% to 28% below 2005 levels by 2025. The US is currently not halfway to achieving this goal.
Biden’s promise is in line with what environmental groups and hundreds of executives in large companies have been calling for. The president will announce the goal at the closely watched climate summit of heads of state and government on Thursday and Friday, where he intends to advance global cooperation to tackle the climate crisis at the summit.
All 40 world leaders the President invited to the virtual summit will be there, including those from China and India, and are expected to make new commitments. The UK and the European Union are committed to reducing emissions by 68% and 55% respectively by 2030. China, the world’s largest emitter, has vowed to peak emissions by 2030 and be carbon neutral by 2060.
U.S. Climate Commissioner John Kerry speaks while White House National Climate Advisor Gina McCarthy listens during a press conference at the White House in Washington on Jan. 27, 2021.
Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
The summit is a chance for the US to rejoin global climate change efforts after the Trump administration left the country under the Paris Agreement, halted federal efforts to reduce domestic emissions, and passed 100+ environmental regulations to encourage fossil fuel production has withdrawn.
The president’s promise also continues his election promise to decarbonise the country’s energy sector by 2030 and get the country on a net-zero path by mid-century.
Biden has so far proposed a $ 2 trillion infrastructure package designed to ease the transition from fossil fuels to clean energy while also promising green job creation. If passed, the legislation would be one of the federal government’s greatest efforts ever to reduce emissions.
“A strong national emissions reduction target is exactly what we need to catalyze a net-zero future and build a more equitable and inclusive economy,” Anne Kelly, vice president of government relations at Ceres, a sustainability nonprofit, said in a statement.
To achieve a net-zero economy by 2050, the US will need to cut emissions by between 57% and 63% over the next decade, according to an analysis by Climate Action Tracker, an independent group that analyzes various government climate commitments.
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This week’s summit is also ahead of a major UN climate change conference in Glasgow, Scotland, in November, at which the states named in the Paris Agreement will announce updated emissions targets for the next decade.
As part of the agreement, the countries are trying to keep global warming well below 2 degrees Celsius or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit compared to pre-industrial levels.
However, the earth is well on its way to warming up 1.5 degrees Celsius, or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit, over the next two decades. This century, without global action, temperatures could rise above 3 degrees Celsius or 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit.
Flavio Lehner, climate researcher and assistant professor of earth and atmospheric sciences at Cornell University, said that Biden’s promise, while ambitious, is likely not enough to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement, and that the global temperature rise largely depends on what others say Countries under the agreement promise next decade.
“Many climate impacts scale almost linearly with warming, so reducing emissions as quickly as possible must remain an important motivation for this and future administrations, regardless of a specific warming target,” said Lehner.
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