Trump 2.0 Un(der)covered: What This Really Means For The Climate — And the World

So “climate change is a hoax” Donald Trump is set to reclaim the reins of the world’s largest historical greenhouse gas emitter.

Unsurprisingly, neither Trump nor Kamala Harris made the climate crisis a prominent feature of their campaigns, daring to confront the elephant in the room. This oversight occurred even as the US was pounded by weather disasters supercharged by an unusually warm Atlantic Ocean that claimed 232 lives across the southwest in a merciless display of climate change’s growing wrath.

And here’s the most ridiculous irony: nearly half of those deaths occurred in the swing state of North Carolina, which, believe it or not, moved decisively behind Trump. In the state’s still-recovering western region, voters lacking proper polling stations cast their ballots in tents.

Meanwhile, global temperatures have been so high through the first 10 months of 2024 that only an implausibly sharp drop in the final two months would prevent a new record from being set.

According to Samantha Burgess, Deputy Director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), “It is now virtually certain that 2024 will be the warmest year on record (surpassing the current record of 1.48C, which was set only last year) and the first year of more than 1.5ºC above pre-industrial levels according to the ERA5 dataset”.

The most recent analysis by Carbon Brief supports this claim, marking a symbolic and ominous milestone as we breach the 1.5ºC threshold for the first time.

Symbolic because nearly 200 countries committed to keeping global temperature rise below 1.5ºC under the 2015 Paris Agreement and mitigating the worst climate change impacts. Yet they are failing big time, currently on track to heat it by roughly double that.

Ominous because this has been a year punctuated by intense heatwaves, deadly storms and devastating wildfires. And if this is the current situation, what does a future with 3ºC above pre-industrial levels have in store for us?

It’s crucial to note that while 2024 may breach the 1.5C limit, this doesn’t mean the Paris goal is lost, as it refers to long-term average temperatures. However, each year we exceed this threshold brings the world closer to permanently surpassing the 1.5C mark.

With levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere still rising, our civilization faces unprecedented challenges in a climate warmer than any we’ve experienced. This inevitably pushes our ability to respond to extreme events — and adapt to a warmer world — to the absolute limit.

Drill, baby, drill, right?

Trump 2.0 Un(der)covered

During his first term, Trump made his disdain for climate policy a cornerstone of his politics, turning the United States into a global environmental outcast. His second term will unfold in a different context — one where the U.S. has enacted meaningful climate legislation, but China has taken a commanding lead in crucial zero-carbon technologies. Consequently, Trump’s climate decisions will have remarkable implications for the country’s economic policy.

So, what might a second Trump administration mean for climate action?

For that, we have Project 2025 to answer. The “book” published by the conservative Heritage Foundation is more than a radical political manifesto. It’s a blueprint to dismantle environmental protections, obliterate climate policies, and gut any institutional checks on presidential power.

After going undercover to meet one of Project 2025’s masterminds, Russell Vought, the Center for Climate Reporting (CCR) uncovered the detailed plan for the upcoming administration — one that could push the US closer to authoritarianism and kill any hopes of keeping global temperatures under the 1.5 C° mark.

The first few steps were easy to predict. That is, basically, a seismic shift in U.S. energy policy, steering the country away from green initiatives and setting the stage for an unrestrained Big Oil feast.

Trump will likely withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement again, approve a new wave of liquefied natural gas export terminals under the banner of “unleashing American energy,” and begin dismantling the Environmental Protection Agency’s climate rules and emission standards. He could place the agency under direct presidential control, transforming it into a puppet for fossil fuel interests. Trump might also “dismantle” and “privatize” much of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) — described as “one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry.”

Vought’s team has been drafting executive orders and secret directives aimed at reversing Biden-era climate policies, completely erasing “climate change references from government documents.” Their vision is clear: a government that answers only to the president, with agencies transformed from watchdogs into enablers of mass drilling, mining, and deforestation. Even federal support for renewable energy, crucial for U.S. climate resilience, could be stripped away.

The most terrifying part? This isn’t just about climate. Vought even boasted about crafting policies for “the largest deportation in history” and readiness to use military force against protesters, revealing the plan’s authoritarian ambitions. And Trump’s public denial of the project? Nothing but smoke and mirrors, according to Vought.

And the secrecy is deliberate. The CCR’s hidden cameras captured Vought proudly describing how the entire Project 2025 blueprint is kept “very, very close hold” — meaning journalists and the public would never see the full extent of it. By avoiding freedom of information laws, Project 2025 intends to hide every detail of its climate-wrecking agenda until it’s too late to stop it.

If Project 2025 unfolds as the investigation suggests, the US could be dragged into a reality where power is absolute, accountability is gone, and opposition is crushed. Essentially, the country risks becoming a fossil-fuel sanctuary with little regard for climate impact and the worldwide people affected by it. In fact, according to a study by Carbon Brief, policies to encourage more drilling and burning of oil and gas would add four billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere by 2030 that could cause global climate damages worth more than $900bn. For context, this is equivalent to the combined annual emissions of the European Union and Japan, or the combined annual total of the world’s 140 lowest-emitting countries.

The Upcoming Climate Chessboard

The impact of these rollbacks won’t be immediate. Take the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) clean car rules — they apply to vehicles through model year 2026. Automakers have already invested to meet these standards. However, vehicles in the latter half of this decade will likely face much weaker rules, if any at all.

Then come the weightier climate policy questions.

First up: Will Trump attempt to repeal or hinder the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), Biden’s landmark climate incentives law? This bill, a major climate policy victory, allocated $369 billion for clean energy investments. Today, the U.S. electric vehicle (EV) market is booming, with sales surging over 50% annually. But Trump has dismissed EVs as a “scam,” vowing to “terminate” IRA spending and “rescind all unspent funds” under the law.

Yet Trump’s crusade against clean energy could backfire spectacularly. The IRA’s investments, primarily tax credits, have predominantly benefited Republican districts. A Washington Post analysis reveals that Trump-supporting districts from 2020 have received triple the IRA funding of Biden-backing areas. New EV, battery, and solar panel factories have sprouted across purple and red America, thrusting 18 House Republicans to ask not to repeal the law.

This is the IRA’s built-in defense mechanism. Like the Affordable Care Act before it, the climate law aims to safeguard itself by intertwining with local economies nationwide. But will this strategy succeed? Can the IRA weather Trump’s first 100 days? And will Trump eventually muster enough House votes in the chessboard for outright repeal? Even if the law stands, Trump might seek alternative ways to undermine it. His threat to “rescind the [IRA’s] unspent funds” raises the specter of impoundment — the legally questionable way for a president to delay or refuse to spend congressionally authorized funding.

Only time will tell.

A Cauldron of Contradictions

Beyond the IRA, the second Trump administration’s climate and environmental policy harbors several lurking fissures. Because an unlikely coalition aided his second ascend to the White House: Elon Musk, an EV and defense contracting billionaire, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer turned anti-vaccine crusader and roadkill enthusiast — yes, a simmering cauldron of contradictions. Trump has promised Kennedy control over public health policy, while Musk will oversee a new Department of Government Efficiency

While these men find common ground on some policies, their views diverge significantly, particularly in energy policy. Trump’s victory speech provided a taste of the fireworks to come when he playfully warned Kennedy to “stay away from the liquid gold” — a not-so-subtle nod to the administration’s fervent embrace of domestic oil production.

Nuclear stirs the cauldron, too. Kennedy, a lifelong opponent of nuclear energy, counts shutting down New York’s Indian Point nuclear reactor among his greatest career victories. In stark contrast, Musk champions nuclear energy, deeming reactor closures “total madness.” The incoming vice president JD Vance quietly aligns with the pro-nuclear camp, while Trump (as always) dances in contradictions — officially advocating for a nuclear renaissance while simultaneously voicing skepticism about its future.

The fault lines deepen. Kennedy’s crusade against the chemical industry clashes violently with Trump’s vision of a refinery-studded America. Meanwhile, Musk has claimed that repealing the IRA could benefit Tesla by hindering its competitors. Yet, today Tesla thrives on regulatory credits born from the climate policies Trump seeks to obliterate.

The backdrop to these disagreements is the permanently altered landscape of climate policy geopolitics. Gone are the days during Trump’s first term when climate policy was a quaint environmental footnote. Today, clean energy — encompassing renewables, batteries, and EVs — is pivotal to modern economic development and geopolitical strategy.

And there is the dragon, getting stronger by the day.

As Trump’s America retreats from the global climate stage, China will surge forward, assuming greater global leadership — ironically fueled by Trump’s own past policies. Over the past decade, China has secured a commanding lead in zero-carbon technologies, now dominating the electric vehicle production, offering cheaper and technologically superior models compared to global competitors. Should the US withdraw its EV support, China stands ready to twist the knife and capture the remaining global market share from U.S. automakers — a process already underway.

So, while the upcoming Trump White House deals with this internal policy schizophrenia, on thing stand clear: This isn’t just about policy; it’s about power, profit, and the very future of our planet.

How Will The World Answer Back?

Even before Trump’s re-election, the 1.5°C target was hanging by a thread. According to a recent United Nations emissions report, most countries are cutting emissions far too slowly to stabilize warming at safe levels. And in all truth, even a climate champion couldn’t have steered the U.S. back on track to meet its climate goals.

With that said, the ripple effects of Trump’s election will not only affect the US, but also send shockwaves across the global climate landscape.

His victory comes just days before (the failing) representatives from nearly 200 nations gather in Azerbaijan for COP29, the annual United Nations climate summit. The two-week meeting, starting November 11, will unfold under the shadow of a Republican president-elect who has promised to lead another withdrawal from the landmark 2015 Paris Agreement.

António Guterres, the UN secretary-general said that “The Paris Agreement can survive, but people sometimes can lose important organs or lose the legs and survive. But we don’t want a crippled Paris Agreement. We want a real Paris Agreement. It’s very important that the United States remains in, and more than remain, that the United States adopts the kind of policies that are necessary to make the 1.5 degrees still a realistic objective.”

A fresh exodus by the world’s largest economy and second-biggest emitter, echoing Trump’s first term, would signal that the U.S. is out of the climate fight, further eroding faith in global climate cooperation and potentially encouraging other countries to follow suit. Without U.S. engagement, efforts to cut emissions in an already strained global system could stall during this critical decade for curbing Earth’s rising temperatures.

The diplomatic world is already reeling. With the U.S. delegation to COP29 reduced to lame-duck status with diminished credibility and leverage, the vital climate finance for developing nations — a key focus of this year’s summit — hangs by a thread. Meanwhile, ambitious carbon-cutting pledges risk being watered down or abandoned altogether.

But make no mistake: Trump will never be above the laws of physics, and neither will the country he leads. Climate change doesn’t give a damn about politics or party lines. The U.S. (and the world) will face fiercer storms, more intense heatwaves, and deadlier wildfires as long as we keep burning oil, coal, and gas. No amount of denial or policy rollbacks can alter this harsh reality. So, if Trump follows through on his threat to ditch the Paris Agreement, the biggest loser will be the United States itself.

So, yes, the 1.5 C° target might be dead but even with all this threatening context, the path to limiting global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius remains open. It all depends on the actions of state governments, local governments, other countries, and ultimately, our own.

It’s time to step up and fill the void.

So be loud.

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