The Clean Power Plan was the core intervention Obama made to tackle the problem of global warming. The plan ambitiously aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions resulting from coal-fired electricity production facilities by 32 percent before 2030. However, on the 10th of October, Scott Pruitt, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), announced that trump had signed an executive order to dismiss the plan. Pruitt, known for his affiliation with climate change denial positions, affirmed the war against coal is over.
A process of energetic deregulation
The overall strategy the Trump administration is putting in place concerning the relationship between the environment and the industry is one of complete deregulation. Or, in Pruitt's words “this is about making sure that we have a pro-growth and pro-environment approach”. We need to set aside the belief, continued Pruitt, that being pro-growth and pro-environment are antithetic concepts. Unfortunately, when words sound too good to be true, they often are so.
With this move, the Trump administration aims at creating new job opportunities in the coal mining industry, while at the same time reducing the cost of electricity. His allegation against Obama anti-fossil fuels strategy is, in fact, to have killed thousands of jobs across the US.
However, in spite of their claim to be attentive to both perspectives, concerns for the environment appear to be inexistent, to the point that Pruitt stated on CNBC that he does not believe CO2 emissions to be the main cause of the upsurge in global temperatures. President Trump himself made numerous statements throughout the years mocking the scientific evidence proving that global warming is real.
So how can we expect an administration so deeply associated with the fossil fuel industry to put the safeguard of the environment as its top priority?
The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 6, 2012
Nevertheless, the promise to bring back to life the King Coal is one of the reasons why Trump is now president of the United States.
When, a year ago, Hillary addressed the workers in Bellaire (Ohio), land of coal mines, she told them the future was of renewable energy. Obviously, many in these swing States of the Midwest, which used to be democratic, voted instead for Trump.
Paving the way for Paris Agreement pull out
The unravelling of the Clean Power Plan can be seen as the first step towards a new self-positioning of the United States concerning environmental matters. A statement of detachment from the global fight against climate change, in the name of short-term profits and a short-sighted perspective on the industrial sector. The peak of the already escalating moves towards deregulation will be, of course, the withdrawal from the Paris Agreement.
Steps in this way have already been made by the Trump Administration. Pruitt stated that the Agreements unfairly penalized the US, as top producers of carbon dioxide, with respect to other big polluters as China and India. However, as a matter of fact, the United States has a per capita emissions of CO2 that is double the value for China and more than eight times the value for India. Trump has also widely spoken in favour of the exit of the US from the Paris Agreement.
