Biden’s election triggered a global surge in optimism that the climate crisis would, finally, be decisively confronted. But the US supreme court’s decision to curtail the American president’s ability to reduce emissions places Biden's attempts on climate in danger of becoming largely moribund. The USA still has no national climate or energy policy in place.
The supreme court’s ruling that the US government could not use its existing powers to phase out coal-fired power generation without clear congressional authorization, “flies in the face of established science and will set back the US’s commitment to keep global temperature below 1.5C”, said Saleemul Huq, director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development in Bangladesh, in reference to the internationally agreed goal to limit global heating before it becomes truly catastrophic, manifesting in more severe heatwaves, floods, droughts and societal unrest. Huq added, “The people who will pay the price for this will be the most vulnerable communities in the most vulnerable developing countries in the world.”
The “incredibly undemocratic SCOTUS ruling” indicates that “backsliding is now the dominant trend in the climate space,” said Yamide Dagnet, director of climate justice at Open Society Foundations and former climate negotiator for the UK and European Union.
António Guterres, the secretary general of the United Nations said that the ruling was a “setback” at a time when countries were badly off track in averting looming climate breakdown.
Al Gore, the former US vice-president said the ruling was the “result of decades of influence and coordination by the fossil fuel lobby and its allies to delay, obstruct, and dismantle progress toward climate solutions”.
Biden’s promise to end oil and gas drilling on public land has been broken.
has vowed that the US will cut its emissions in half by 2030 but this goal, and America’s waning international credibility on climate change, will be lost without both legislation from Congress and strong executive actions. Both of these remain highly unlikely.
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