Trump commits the US to more fossil fuel production, backs out of Paris Agreement again

In a series of new executive orders, the re-elected US president declared a national energy emergency that would weaken environmental safeguards for energy projects.

Trump inauguration 2025
United States president Donald Trump, who was sworn into office again on 20 January 2025, has pledged to boost the country's fossil fuel production. Image: The White House/ Wikimedia Commons

On his first day back as United States president, Donald Trump declared a “national energy emergency” as a commitment to more fossil fuel production, and pulled the country out of a global climate deal once again.

Trump, who was sworn into office on Monday, signed a series of new executive orders that emphasised his intention to boost the exploration and production of oil, gas and critical minerals in the US.

“America will be a manufacturing nation once again, and we have something that no other manufacturing nation will ever have: the largest amount of oil and gas of any country on Earth. And we are going to use it,” he said in his inauguration speech.

His executive order declaring the national energy emergency framed the situation as a matter of national security, and said that the previous administration’s policies have led to “an inadequate and intermittent energy supply and an increasingly unreliable grid.” 

“The integrity and expansion of our nation’s energy infrastructure…is an immediate and pressing priority for the protection of the US’ national and economic security,” it said.

In a widely expected but highly criticised move, Trump also withdrew the US from the 2015 United Nations Paris Agreement, a climate deal that had promised to keep global temperature rise below 2° Celsius. Upon signing the order, he called the agreement an “unfair, one sided ripoff.” Trump withdrew from the Paris Agreement in 2020 during his first term as US president, with Biden returning to the pact the following year.

“The US will not sabotage our own industries while China pollutes with impunity,” Trump said. The US is the world’s largest historical emitter, overtaken by China only in the early 2000s. According to the Global Carbon Budget, the US accounted for 13 per cent of global emissions in 2023 compared to China’s 31.5 per cent.

United Nations climate change chief Simon Stiell responded to Trump’s decision by pointing out that the world’s clean energy industry is the “economic growth deal of the decade” as it was worth US$2 trillion in 2024 and is still growing. “Embracing it will mean massive profits, millions of manufacturing jobs and clean air,” he said.

Conversely, ignoring the clean energy market “only sends all that vast wealth to competitor economies, while climate disasters like droughts, wildfires and superstorms keep getting worse, destroying property and businesses, hitting nation-wide food production, and driving economy-wide price inflation,” Stiell said in a statement.

He added, “The door remains open to the Paris Agreement, and we welcome constructive engagement from any and all countries.”

International response

International organisations reaffirmed their commitment to global climate action despite Trump’s decision, and lamented the lost opportunities for the US.

“The US federal government’s step away from international policy discussions that are shaping the clean energy future is a disservice to American businesses and people, opening the door for other major economies to attract greater investment and talent,” said the We Mean Business Coalition, a non-profit for corporate climate action.

It added that Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, while “deeply disappointing”, would not change the global course of climate action. “Other countries will continue to accelerate their transition to clean energy because it makes good business and economic sense.”

ClientEarth, an environmental law non-profit, described the withdrawal as a “reckless abandonment of leadership that weakens global cooperation at a critical moment”.

“Despite this, the global fight against climate change is gaining momentum. Courts around the world are holding governments and corporations to account and setting higher standards for climate action, and countries are stepping up with bold climate commitments to fill the leadership void,” said Laura Clarke, chief executive of ClientEarth.

“We look forward to the day we can welcome the US back into the Paris Agreement. In the meantime, businesses, investors, cities and regions along with countries around the world will continue to go all in for the Paris Agreement,” said the We Mean Business Coalition.

US environmental protections gutted

In an executive order titled “Unleashing American Energy”, the president said that US policy will now encourage energy exploration on all its lands and waters, and to establish itself as the leading producer and processor of minerals including rare earths.

Interestingly, the orders recognise only oil and gas, coal, biofuels, geothermal heat, hydropower and critical minerals as “energy”, but does not mention solar or wind power.

Trump also rolled back on US environmental protections where energy projects are concerned, calling for exemptions to be made under various laws for endangered species, marine and water-related protection.

Environmental advocates in the United States have described Trump’s orders as unlawful and said that they would oppose the orders in court.

“(Trump’s) reckless contempt for our nation’s natural heritage and people’s health will only get worse, but we’ll fight him at every step,” said Kierán Suckling, executive director at the Center for Biological Diversity, an American non-profit.

“The US has some of the strongest environmental laws in the world, and no matter how petulantly Trump behaves, these laws don’t bend before the whims of a wannabe dictator,” Suckling said in a statement. “The use of emergency powers doesn’t allow a president to bypass our environmental safeguards just to enrich himself and his cronies. We’ll see Trump in court to challenge each of these horrific, senseless attacks on wildlife, public lands and our health.”

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