Guest post by David Middleton

Science & Environment

Juncker rejects US climate deal re-negotiation

By Matt McGrath
Environment correspondent
14 June 2017

The European Commission President said: “We have spent 20 years negotiating”, and now was the time for implementation.

US President Trump has claimed that the accord could be amended and made more palatable to his country.

[…]

“The European Union will not renegotiate the Paris Agreement,” Mr Juncker said.

“The 29 articles of the agreement must be implemented and not renegotiated. Climate action does not need more distractions. We have spent 20 years negotiating. Now it is the time for action. Now it is the time for implementation.”

The president of the Marshall Island, Hilda Heine, also addressed the parliamentarians, meeting in Strasbourg. She re-iterated her view that the Paris agreement was set in stone.

“We cannot do better (than Paris), and we don’t have the luxury of more time,” she said.

She urged the EU member states and other countries to use the three years before the US pulls out of Paris to try to convince President Trump of the importance of climate action.

She also called on Europe to adopt harder goals when it comes to cutting emissions of carbon dioxide.

“We will not stay within 1.5C unless Europe and others move before 2020 to raise ambition.” The bloc should adopt five-year climate targets instead of the current 10-year plans, she said.

By a huge majority the EU Parliament voted on Wednesday in favour of binding national targets for cutting emissions from areas including transport, agriculture and waste management. These areas are not covered by Europe’s emissions trading scheme.

[…]

BBC

So much material in such a short article.

An agreement that has no enforcement mechanism and allows its participants to set and revise their own emissions targets is “set in stone”…  Riiight.

“We cannot do better than Paris”… But we must do better than Paris… Even though it’s “set in stone”… Riiight.

At least there’s a bright side.  After President Trump wisely withdrew these United States from the Paris agreement, “by a huge majority the EU Parliament voted on Wednesday in favour of binding national targets for cutting emissions from areas including transport, agriculture and waste management.”

Talk about a win-win deal!  President Trump decides to not shoot our economy in the foot… And the EU volunteers to shoot their economy in both feet!

“The worst thing you can possibly do in a deal is seem desperate to make it. That makes the other guy smell blood, and then you’re dead.”

—Donald J. Trump, The Art of the Deal