Climate Regulations: Biden’s Administration May Go Green

Climate regulations
Climate regulations

The weakening of the United States’ climate regulations characterized trump’s administration. Regardless, large corporates organizations took giant leaps in a bid to decarbonize their activities. From the likes of oil levianth BP to the tech giant Apple to retail jumbo Amazon- all committed to decarbonizing their businesses.

However, the companies are yet to reach their net-zero targets; there is a great possibility that this will change under President-elect Joe Biden’s tenure.

Speaking to MotherJones, Tom Murray, a companies’ emission reduction advisor from Environmental Defense Fund, says that the president has eliminated uncertainty needed to ensure the net-zero targets.

“Companies and investors struggle with uncertainty. They often use it as an excuse for inaction. So by making climate change a top priority, president-elect Biden is putting an end to that uncertainty and calling for real action,” said Murray

Paris Agreement on Climate Regulations

The 2015 Paris Agreement purposes to strengthen the global response to the climate change threat by maintaining global temperature below 2 degrees Celsius and further pursue a temperature below 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Former President Donald Trump earlier withdrew from the Paris Agreement on June 1, 2017, saying that the agreement would “undermine” the United States economy and put the US at a “permanent disadvantage.”

Ex-Vice President Biden intends to rejoin the Paris Agreement, which the CEO of the sustainable investing Ceres, Mindy Lubber, welcomes.

“That’s so much more than symbolic. It creates a goal for us, a North Star, to get to net-zero emissions by 2050. Companies want to go there, but they want to know the government is going there as well, “said Lubber.

Possible steps Biden may take

First is backpedaling on some of Trump’s revocations, such as bringing back vehicles’ fuel economy standards, controls emissions by power plants, and reducing methane emission from the gas and oil division.

Secondly, Greenpeace campaign director, Rolf Skar, suggests Bidens’ administration should negotiate trade agreements with climate goals in mind, a move that will help prevent disasters.

“Global Supply chains that are dependent on palm oil from Indonesia, paper from Indonesia, soy, and beef from Amazon. Companies pretty early on realized this is a PR disaster for us; we’re fueling the fires in these rain forests,” Skar says.

Lastly, the US should exert pressure to cause global action on climate change, just like when the EU boldly blocked a vital trade deal with the South American countries until Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsanaro, consents to increase his efforts in curbing wildfires and deforestation in the Amazon.

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