About Trumps withdrawl of the US from the Paris Climate Agreement

The $3 billion annual expenditure doesn't do a lot to reduce the estimated average future costs of $1.9 trillion annually (in today’s dollars) based upon the "Do Nothing" policy of the Trump Administration.
https://www.nrdc.org/sites/default/files/cost.pdf

Of course Trump didn't actually withdraw the United States from the Paris Accord because he can't under international law.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/...ly-withdraw-u-s-from-paris-climate-agreement/

So the United States, in spite of what Trump claims, is still obligated to fulfill mandatory provisions under the Paris Accord based upon international law until at least 2020 (when it's doubtful the Trump will still be the president).

 

So the deal is even worse than thought.

Obama signed us up for a deal that cost 4 years to get out of and the terms of that exit werent even known. We got us another "you have to sign it before you know whats in it" moment.

If me and you were going to do a business deal, would you sign up if I told you that you couldnt see the exit requirements until after you committed to the deal?

 

And what will happened if the US doesn't pay? Will we go to world jail?

 

Paris agreement does nothing but cost the US Trillions of dollars.

 

Nobody is sending any money anywhere. All the agreements were national commitments to reduce carbon--based pollutants nationally.

Wherever did you jokers get that idea ... !

 

OK, so another one saying the WaPo is lying.

 

It's because Obama did not even attempt to get the Treaty ratified. Without approval of 2/3 of the Senate, any agreement a President makes with other countries is temporary. Obama was too lazy and incompetent to get the Treaty ratified, making it a gesture rather than a real action. Anything imposed by an executive order can be rescinded by one.

 

The commitments to reduce pollution were national and not binding. There is no fine if a country misses targets. There is no outside funding of countries to meet their targets. It is binding only in its nature as an International Agreement. (Like the World Trade Organization sets rules for international trade.)

From Time Mag here: What to Know About the Historic 'Paris Agreement' on Climate Change

Nobody gets fined. Nobody gets hung. Yes, it requires government expenditures in order to bring about the lessening of pollution levels.

It's just a written agreement signed internationally, now without the US, the second largest polluting country on this planet ...

 

No country legislature need ratify the agreement, dimwit. It is not a treaty, but an agreement.

Ratification would have taken forever. Also, the agreement iself has features that prevent it from being labeled an "international treaty", thus does not require any national treaty-ratification process. It would have taken forever to have all national legislatures ratify it.

Which is the way all countries signed the agreement - without any vote by any national legislature. It was for each country to make the commitment nationally, because pollution "travels".

We get your pollution here in Europe, brought in by the prevailing "Westerlies" (consider the map) from the US. The East Coast of the US gets pollution from all the states to the west. If you live in an eastern seaboard state then screw-you ...

 

You're right. The US contributed at first $3B to help smaller countries reach treaty agreements on levels of pollution.

Donald Dork reduced the amount to $1B, and now has killed the agreement it altogether.

Happy Pollution, Amerika ... !

 

The financial payments are voluntary on the part of all nations and not just the major industrialized nations are help fund the incentives. Part of the initial $10 billion in pledges, of which the US pledged $3 billion (and Trump is canceling $2 billion just so other countries can accurately state the United States doesn't fulfill it's promises), other funding is coming from countries like Mexico and Vietnam.

Let's see, in the last two days I've replaced all of the outdoor lighting at my house that had previously been on a 24vdc system with solar powered pathway lighting for $160 (24 all metal and glass, no plastic) and the claim is that the average family can't afford that?

No one is claiming that our entire power grid can or should be based upon photovoltaic but there are numerous home applications that people can easily afford that reduces the amount of electrical energy from the power plants.

We can also note that in the case of using coal the only reason it's relatively inexpensive is because the power companies are not being held fully liable financially for the environmental damage they cause. Duke Energy, for example, created a massive spill of highly toxic coal ash into the Dan River and in the end only about 5% of the coal ash was removed from the river. This left both radioactive isotopes and heavy metals in the coal ash to settle into the sediment of the Dan River. Had Duke Energy been required to remove 100% of the coal ash pollution from the Dan River, and also been subjected to punitive damages for allowing the coal ash spill, the cost would have been in the trillions of dollars. The cost of the electricity would have soared to far beyond any renewable energy source.

 

Yes, the part where 96 other countries, including France, already have higher pollution levels than the US.

 

About Trump getting us out of the Royal Anal Suprise known as the Paris Climate Agreement,

FANTASTIC!

 

Oh look, another leftist apoplectic about the Paris Accord who didn't even know how it worked.

Amazing.

 

The pre-Gorbachev Soviet Union thought in a linear (Leninist) way: Once a communist state, always a communist state.

Liberals, it seems, think in much the same way: Once a liberal policy is enacted, it will always be in place (unless it is liberalized even more).

Therefore, liberals were understandably outraged when President Trump demonstrated that this is not necessarily true...

 

Piffle 'n drivel ...

 

More piffle 'n drivel.

What you know about "liberal policy" would fit a thimble.

Trump has been shooting himself in the foot for months. He's a self-infatuate dork who is in-over-his-head.

His approval rating yesterday was 38% and heading south ...

 

Not to mention the CO2 in the air you breath ...

 

What I do know is that the left thinks an unenforceable agreement that allows China to continue to pollute like crazy until 2030 is a good thing. Then they miss the part where if China takes our money, no one can hold them accountable for not adhering to the agreement post 2030.

All of the attacks on Trumps decisions have been PURE emotion, with little to no knowledge of this particular topic.

I'll ask you the same question I've asked others that are currently pulling their hair out:

What are the specific negative points with the US leaving the accord that concern you?

 

Let's start with the fact that it was an agreement that 175 countries agreed to, after many years of stalemate.

I personally stand to lose nothing - It's our children, grandchildren, and so forth who are the big losers.

 

WHERE THERE'S THE WILL, THERE'S A WAY

The no-knowledge is YOUR problem. And YOU are showing a disregard for the enormous need of energy for burgeoning economies - of which the US is presently a renewed member (after the damages of the Great Recession.)

We are allowing China nothing. You got that wrong because you are oblivious to the manner in which the Chinese negotiated their entry into the agreement. Just who was going to enforce the agreement rules? You and what army were about to force China to do anything it did not want to do in less than the time necessary it thought plausible?

In fact, China is building its own nuclear-reactors (for generating electricity) to alleviate the primary source of pollution in the country. And it is doing so along side the same kinds of nuclear-reactors that both European and American companies are building there.

People like you are pissing in the wind because you haven't the foggiest notion of how the agreement was arranged. Besides, because of Donald Dork and his promise to 75,000 coal-miners, the US has decided to exit the only treaty in the history of mankind to tackle the deeply important issue of World Climate Change.

Are you blind to the climatic risks of this planet? It seems so - out of some misplaced "patriotic" devotion to the status-quo as well as a consummate ignorance of the climatic facts...

PS: "Where there's the will, there's the way"

To wit:

 

You started out the thread not even knowing the details of the accord and now you're going to pretend that nuclear power is the answer?

Yeah lets trade some carbon in the air for radiation all over the place, and trying to come up with a way to safely store the waste. I mean, they're only radioactive for like 10,000 years.

You talk about dangers to the planet and your solution is nuclear waste, ideal terror targets, plus all the other challenges with nuclear energy?

 

So you'd like to rack up your childrens debt by sending billions of dollars to places like China and Afghanistan for them to waste on whatever they want?

Why do you think North Korea signed that agreement? Do you think they're going to use that free money to build wind farms?

 

Exactly - let's talk about a "free ride"! Kill somebody in a car willfully (wildly drunken driving) and we'll see how a judge treats you.

The total cost, one must admit, does not cover that of all illnesses and their remedial costs that result from pollution. Or, for that matter, those who die before age (average being 79 for the US and 83 for Europe) due to air pollution.

I frankly don't see how one can accurately arrive at a believable total sum figure of the Total Cost in Lives Lost Due to Pollution.

Neither is the Total Overhead Cost in Lives modest as most Replicants on this forum would have us believe ...