US President Donald Trump’s protectionist rhetoric and promises to roll back his predecessor’s environmental policies have translated into reality. He declared on 1 June 2017 that the United States would withdraw from the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. This surprised nobody but has worried deeply the global community, nonetheless, about what this means for the future of the global climate governance.

Beyond the political symbolism of Trump’s announcement, however, the short- and longer term impacts might be marginal as many US federal states and US energy companies will continue expanding renewables in the US energy mix and insist on restrictive environmental regulations. Moreover, a withdrawal from the Paris Agreement can only enter into force after November 2020 (when the next US presidential elections will take place).

… Frank Umbach PhD was recently a Visiting Senior Fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University. He is Research Director at the European Centre for Energy and Resource Security (EUCERS), King’s College, London (www.eucers.eu) and Senior Associate at the Centre for European Security Strategies (CESS GmbH), Munich (www.cess-net.eu). He was previously also a Co-Chair of CSCAP-Europe.