16 | New Scientist | 24 October 2020
AS US President Donald Trump
prepares to face the ballot
box in the hopes of winning a
second term, his handling of the
coronavirus pandemic will be at
the forefront of voters’ minds.
But Trump’s impact on health,
space and environment policy
during his time in office also
warrants examining.
In the past four years,
Trump has promised to reverse
environmental regulations and
climate change policy, to repeal
and replace his predecessor Barack
Obama’s landmark healthcare
policy and to revive the fortunes
of NASA. Has he succeeded?A green undoing
One promise Trump has kept is
the removal of the US from the
landmark 2015 Paris Agreement
on climate change, in which nearly
all nations agreed goals to reduce
carbon emissions in an attempt
to keep global warming below 2°C
above pre-industrial levels.
During a campaign speech
in May 2016, Trump said: “We’re
going to cancel the Paris climate
agreement and stop all payments
of US tax dollars to UN global
warming programmes.” He
followed through once in office,
announcing in June 2017 that
the US would exit the agreement,
though Congress continued to
fund such UN programmes.
Environmental campaigners
were dismayed. As the US is the
second largest carbon emitter
behind China, combating global
warming can only be done with it
on side. “The alternative is the end
of the world as we know it,” says
Kassie Siegel at the Center for
Biological Diversity Action Fund
in Washington DC. “We’ve known
this for a long time, we’ve known
what the science demands.”administration poked holes in
a rule that requires coal power
plants to cut their emissions
of toxic mercury. Oil and gas
companies, meanwhile, no longer
have to report and repair methane
leaks. Methane is a particularly
important greenhouse gas in the
short term because it has a greater
warming effect than carbon
dioxide. “The oil and gas sector
is a massive source of methane,
and it’s technically feasible and
extremely cheap and easy to
stop those leaks,” says Siegel.
Trump has repeatedly claimed
that the US has the cleanest air
and water in the world, which
isn’t true. In fact, efforts to reduce
pollution have been weakened
under his leadership. For example,
Obama-era emissions standards
for vehicles that required a 5 per
cent decrease in carbon emissions
each year have now been
downgraded to 1.5 per cent, whileTrump’s scientific legacy
Whatever the outcome of the US presidential election, Donald Trump is likely to have
a lasting impact on the nation’s health and environment. Chelsea Whyte reportsof things intended to ram through
as much fossil fuel production as
possible,” says Siegel.
These include weakening
regulations put in place under
the Obama administration’s Clean
Power Plan (CPP). Its Trump-era
replacement, the Affordable
Clean Energy rule, scraps federal
emissions standards and gives
responsibility for setting those
standards to state governments.
This effectively takes the legs
out from the US Environmental
Protection Agency, which is
responsible for policing
infractions but is now unable
to set common standards.
The CPP called for a reduction
in greenhouse gas emissions
from the power sector by 32 per
cent between 2005 and 2030,
and would have relied on states
moving away from using coal
power plants. Its elimination
makes it easier to keep coal
plants operating for longer.
Fossil fuel industries have
also benefited from deregulation
in other ways. The TrumpUS electionEV
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“The Paris climate accord
shackles economies and has done
nothing to reduce greenhouse
gas emissions,” says Judd Deere,
deputy press secretary for the
White House.
The US won’t officially exit the
Paris Agreement until 4 November,
the day after the US election, due
to the rules of withdrawal in the
accord. Siegel thinks rejoining
could happen quickly under
another president, but other
environmental policy changes
may be harder to reverse.The Trump administration has
rolled back dozens of regulations,
such as endangered species
protections, limits on greenhouse
gas emissions and emissions
standards for power plants and
vehicles. “There’s a whole suite580 km
Length of wall constructed
on the US-Mexico borderDonald Trump signs
an executive order on
energy and infrastructure