Why rejoining the Paris Agreement is so important to the US

On June 1, 2017, the day President Donald Trump announced his intention to remove the United States from the Paris Agreement, my phone rang non-stop.

The directors of the investment firms and the companies we work with, some of the largest in the world, had the same question: “What happens now?”

That announcement was the moment we had been dreading. The newspapers had been full of stories up to the last minute about the debates going on inside the White House.

Now it was official. We were heading out. It was a blow to the planet and the economy that we at Ceres personally felt because we were instrumental in mobilizing the American business and investor support that helped bring the Paris Agreement to its goal. After decades of negotiations, almost every country in the world had voluntarily agreed to cut the carbon emissions that triggered the climate crisis.

After that hard work, American companies did not give up. In the hours and days after the announcement, we, along with several partner organizations, helped mobilize 900 influential companies and investors to declare on June 7 that ‘We’re still in’. Since then, the coalition has grown significantly to include 4,000 leaders representing 159 million Americans and $ 9.5 trillion from the US economy, pledging to support climate action and the US promise to deliver on the goals of the Accord. Paris and efforts to limit the rise in global temperature to no more. 1.5 degrees Celsius. Ceres, along with its partners, also launched major global investor initiatives, including Climate Action 100+ and The Investor Agenda. Both have also managed to boost US business and investor action in line with the landmark agreement.

That’s why it was a victory for the climate when Joe Biden was declared the new president-elect on November 7, just four days after the United States officially abandoned the Paris Agreement. Because biden has promised that, immediately after taking office on January 20, he will not only rejoin the Paris Agreement, but will also convene a world summit to push for even more aggressive action.

Why is this such a critical achievement for the United States that we are on our way back?

It all comes down to momentum.

On June 1, 2017, the day President Donald Trump announced his intention to remove the United States from the Paris Agreement, my phone rang non-stop.

The directors of the investment firms and the companies we work with, some of the largest in the world, had the same question: “What happens now?”

That announcement was the moment we had been dreading. The newspapers had been full of stories up to the last minute about the debates going on inside the White House.

Now it was official. We were dating. It was a blow to the planet and the economy that we at Ceres personally felt because we were instrumental in mobilizing the American business and investor support that helped bring the Paris Agreement to its goal. After decades of negotiations, almost every country in the world had voluntarily agreed to cut the carbon emissions that triggered the climate crisis.

After that hard work, American companies did not give up. In the hours and days after the announcement, we, along with several partner organizations, helped mobilize 900 influential companies and investors to declare on June 7 that ‘We’re still in’. Since then, the coalition has grown significantly to include 4,000 leaders representing 159 million Americans and $ 9.5 trillion from the US economy, pledging to support climate action and the US promise to deliver on the goals of the Accord. Paris and efforts to limit the rise in global temperature to no more. 1.5 degrees Celsius. Ceres, along with its partners, also launched major global investor initiatives, including Climate Action 100+ and The Investor Agenda. Both have also managed to boost US business and investor action in line with the landmark agreement.

That’s why it was a victory for the climate when Joe Biden was declared the new president-elect on November 7, just four days after the United States officially abandoned the Paris Agreement. Because biden has promised that, immediately after taking office on January 20, he will not only rejoin the Paris Agreement, but will also convene a world summit to push for even more aggressive action.

Why is this such a critical achievement for the United States that we are on our way back?

It all comes down to momentum.

The great advance of the Paris Agreement – why it continues to gain ground where other climate plans failed – is that it relies on peer pressure. Unlike previous attempts to create legally binding targets, countries make voluntary commitments, or nationally determined contributions, which they agree to increase over time. All countries should regularly report on their emissions and implementation efforts, creating transparency and a way to compare efforts.

The United States will rejoin the Paris Agreement at one of the most critical times for our planet and our economy. Being back gives us the authority to accelerate the efforts being made to address the climate crisis and increase global ambitions.

Over the past year, major powers, including China, EU nations, Japan and South Korea, made bold promises to cut their emissions to net zero by mid-century. In a year in which the Arctic burned, California skies turned red amid unprecedented wildfires and the Atlantic produced a record 30 tropical storms, these new targets are a recognition that time is running out.

Now America is sending a powerful message that the future is net zero. In addition to rejoining the Paris Agreement, Biden has promised that the United States will be net zero by 2050. What the United States chooses to do matters. Although countries around the world advanced without us for the past four years, we are now putting the strength of the world’s largest economy, along with the backing of the world’s largest investors and companies, behind this effort.

Even with a potentially divided government, a Biden administration can work to achieve the climate commitments it makes through ambitious financial and regulatory action at the federal level. For example, ordering government agencies to toughen regulations on greenhouse gas emissions and restoring the more than 125 environmental rules and regulations revoked by the Trump administration, including rules to curb methane emissions and carbon emissions. of coal and gas plants and fuels. efficiency standards for passenger cars and heavy trucks.

At the same time, the new administration can now empower, rather than impede, the bold programs that states began pushing for the past four years in the absence of federal leadership. Policy initiatives such as the decision by California, the world’s fifth-largest economy, to have all new passenger cars sold in the state by 2035 be electric. . Or the Transportation and Climate Initiative, an effort on the cusp of adoption by 12 Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states and the District of Columbia to limit emissions from transportation, the largest and fastest growing source of GHG emissions. In the USA.

By rejoining the global stage through the Paris Agreement, the United States will also be able to rebuild diplomatic and regulatory alliances. That will put pressure on global financial systems, including our own, to take concrete steps to assess and act to mitigate climate risk through supervision and regulatory action, such as a global standard for climate reporting. A clear example of how the tides are turning: after the election, the Federal Reserve applied to be an observer member of the Network to Green the Financial System, the global climate club of 75 central banks from which the United States has been conspicuously absent.

Just as crucial, by embracing the Paris Agreement, Biden is positioning the US to regain its competitive position in the global race to reap the economic benefits of the transition to a net zero world. So it’s significant that Biden has appointed former Secretary of State John Kerry as his presidential envoy for climate. As one of the architects of the Paris Agreement, Kerry has the experience and relationships to help restore America’s climate leadership in the world.

As we celebrate the fifth anniversary of the Paris Agreement, the We Are Still In coalition issued a new US statement, signed by 1,500 leaders, reaffirming not just the commitment of cities, states, businesses, universities, and others to increase climate action. , but to work with the new administration. With the obstructionism of the past administration gone, we call on the Biden administration to drive economic growth in all sectors of the economy through sustainable investments that create jobs, expand US leadership, and reimagine community partnership to promote just and equitable climate solutions and build resilience to climate change.

Returning to the global climate fold this winter will be just the first step in helping to achieve those goals. But the new administration can rest assured that it will have the support of the business community that has spent the past four years setting ambitious goals, incorporating sustainability into its operations and funding, and advocating for climate change at the state and federal levels.

Because we have a great opportunity at our fingertips. If the United States truly joins the bold commitments of China, the EU, Japan and South Korea, we will finally be a surprising distance from the Paris goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, for the first time in history. .

Mindy Lubber is CEO and President of Ceres. Lubber is a recipient of the Champions of the Earth Award—United Nations highest environmental honor for leadership in climate change and sustainability.