In the first 24 hours of taking office, US President Donald Trump canceled for the second time US participation in the Paris Agreement.

The environmental charter commits 196 countries to the goal of keeping global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) compared to pre-industrial times.

The only countries outside it are Iran, Libya and Yemen.

Trump said at his inauguration: “America will be an industrialized country again, and we have something that no other industrialized country will ever have: the largest amount of oil and gas of any country on Earth, and we will use it.” Speech at the US Capitol on Monday. “we will Dig, baby, dig“.

Trump also backed away from the climate deal in his first term, when he campaigned on the theory that climate change was a hoax promoted by China to hinder economic growth in the United States. There were no such allegations in his last campaign.

Unlike Trump’s 2017 withdrawal, which took four years to take effect and was reversed by the incoming administration of Joe Biden, this withdrawal will take effect within a year.

Here’s what you should know:

Why is Trump doing this (again)?

Trump recently said that the Paris Agreement would cost the United States billions of dollars. He was referring to pledges made by advanced economies to grant developing economies $100 billion in grants and facilitate their transition to renewable energy. The United States has also traditionally been against any form of carbon penalties imposed on polluting companies, and has not created a carbon market.

Trump has also consistently supported domestic fossil fuel production as a form of national energy security. He did not explain why he did not view locally produced renewable energy in the same way.

“The investments already made in US fossil gas will ensure that US gas production and exports will almost double over the next five years,” said Michalis Mathioulakis, academic director of the Greek Energy Forum in Thessaloniki, a think tank. He added: “Trump will of course take credit for this, but you cannot achieve increases in production in a short period.

Matthewlakis, as well as many other analysts, believes that the United States wants to replace Russia as Europe’s main supplier of fossil gas, because it sees European dependence on Russian gas as a security obstacle. This also deprives Russia of its most profitable markets, and thus of tax income.

“certainly [the US] “It is trying to displace Russia in the global market,” Matthewlakis said. “Let us not forget that the lifting of the export ban on liquefied natural gas occurred in the shadow of… [former US President Barack] “Obama.”

Will it stop the energy transition in the United States?

Trump’s first attempt to stop decarbonization of the economy failed.

US Energy Information Administration (EIA) data show that 35,723 megawatts worth of coal-fired power plants were withdrawn during Trump’s first term, more than in President Obama’s first six years in office. They have been replaced by less polluting fossil gas plants, a trend that began under Obama and continued unabated during Trump’s first term.

“Reversing the clean energy momentum in the United States and the world will not be easy,” said Nikos Mantzaris, founder of The Green Tank, an energy think tank in Athens. “Renewables are the cheapest form of energy of all, and in the United States states make their own decisions.”

Solar and wind power grew during Trump’s first term, and surpassed coal power for the first time in US history in December 2020, as Trump prepared to leave office.

Which direction It is set to continue.

In 2022, then-President Joe Biden passed the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which provided $270 billion in tax breaks and other incentives to invest in renewable energy. By August last year, the IRA had stimulated $215 billion of investment in solar and wind production, and the government offered homeowners $8 billion in tax breaks to carry out energy-efficient renovations.

Biden’s stated goal was to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent compared to 2005 by 2030, and by 60 percent in 2035. Biden signed a series of IRA projects in his final two months in office, and those subsidies will continue In payment. Until 2032, four years after Trump leaves office.

The Energy Information Administration expects that most of the growing electricity consumption in the United States in 2025 and 2026 will be provided by solar energy.

This is part of the global transformation.

The International Energy Agency, an intergovernmental organization and research center headquartered in Paris, It was expected Renewable energy sources will account for two-thirds of electricity production in advanced economies in 2030.

Matthewlakis also believes Trump’s policies won’t make much difference. But he told Al Jazeera that there will be a slowdown in the shift to solar and wind energy for other reasons.

“Where there has been rapid development in renewable energy sources, when these sources have reached more than 40 percent of the energy mix, there have been problems – that we cannot expand the use of clean energy without developing electricity storage and flexible grids,” Matthewlakis said. . “So there was a slowdown. This was going to reach Europe and the United States anyway.”

How much carbon does the United States put into the air compared to other countries?

The United States is the world’s second-largest polluter after China, emitting 6 billion tons of carbon equivalent gases in 2023, according to the World Resources Institute. This represents about 16 percent of the global quantity of 37 billion tons.

China tops the list, producing more than twice the US emissions. The European Union and India follow the United States with about 3.4 billion tons each.

How do other countries react?

The Chinese Foreign Ministry said it was “concerned” about the US withdrawal.

“Climate change is a common challenge facing all of humanity. No country can remain outside of it,” a statement from the Foreign Ministry in Beijing said.

European Union Climate Commissioner Wopke Hoekstra described this as a “truly unfortunate development.”

Does this expose US goods to EU carbon taxes?

The European Commission, which has just taken office, is supposed to seriously consider imposing a carbon tax on goods imported from countries that do not have a carbon market such as the EU’s emissions trading system.

An emissions trading system sells carbon credits to polluters, giving them an incentive to switch to cleaner forms of energy.

The Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) aims to level the playing field for European energy companies and manufacturers who compete with countries that do not impose costs on pollution.

If Trump follows through on his threat to impose tariffs on European exports to the United States, this would make implementation of the CBAM agreement against the United States more likely.