Biden raises hopes of addressing climate crisis as Cop26 nears

Joe Biden’s pledges of strong action on the climate crisis have buoyed international hopes that 2021 can be a breakthrough year, resetting the world on a greener path to net zero greenhouse gas emissions.

Climate experts cheered the inauguration of the new US president, who has vowed to rejoin the Paris agreement, rethink US reliance on fossil fuels, and devote hundreds of billions of dollars in stimulus spending to low-carbon economic growth.

Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland and chair of the Elders group of former world leaders, told the Guardian: “Joe Biden’s presidency offers the chance for a global reset, and his anticipated executive order to rejoin the Paris agreement is an excellent step in the right direction. We are also expecting to see similar commitments to international cooperation on the existential threats posed by nuclear weapons and future pandemics. I welcome the fact that we will now see sustained US support for multilateralism, underwritten by a solid commitment to universal human rights.”

Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency, the world’s foremost energy economist, urged Biden to kickstart the US capacity for innovation to solve the climate crisis. “About half of the emissions cuts needed to put the world on a path to net zero by 2050 will need to come from technologies that are not on the market yet,” he explained. “Innovation is extremely critical. The US can be a leader in innovation, and has a major opportunity – and responsibility – to push for clean technology innovation.”

Biden had made his commitment to climate action “clear and strong”, said Nicholas Stern, the renowned climate economist, giving hope that the world’s biggest economy could lead a global green recovery from the pandemic. “[Climate action] is at the heart of his strategy for investment, infrastructure and recovery in the US,” said Stern. “His arrival in the White House is splendid news for the future of lives and livelihoods on the planet.”

This year will be crucial in resetting the global trajectory on greenhouse gas emissions, as the world deals with the coronavirus crisis. Despite a sharp plunge in carbon output last spring as lockdowns took hold in many regions, emissions have resumed their upward march, and experts have warned they may even accelerate if the wrong decisions are made on restarting the global economy.

An analysis last November for the Guardian found that if Biden’s plans were implemented in full, the prospects for a global green recovery from the pandemic would be transformed. At present, governments – including the US under Donald Trump – are failing, with a few exceptions, to ensure that stimulus spending benefits low-carbon industries, and instead are cementing higher emissions by pouring money into fossil fuels.

Biden’s plans may not pass through Congress unscathed, given the Democrats’ slender Senate majority, but even partial success could rescue the global green recovery.

Biden has spoken repeatedly of the need for healing divisions and fostering unity, and Lord Stern said a focus on the environment could be a unifying force across the world, galvanising nations with a common purpose. “In a world of fractured politics, action on climate can now draw nations and peoples together, and we have a chance of both managing the immense risk of climate change and finding a new sustainable, inclusive and resilient path to development and growth,” he said.

US political leadership could also prove decisive as world governments meet this November for the postponed UN climate summit, Cop26, in Glasgow. The UK hosts of the summit hope to steer all leading economies to a long-term pledge of reaching net zero emissions around mid-century, and to bring forward national plans setting out emissions reductions in the next decade.

At a Climate Ambition Summit hosted by the UK, the UN and France last December, intended as a staging post to Cop26, the US was not represented among the 80 world leaders taking part, as Trump refused to make any commitments on emissions and instead tried to roll back many US carbon-cutting efforts. Biden, by contrast, plans to host his own major summit, to take place this spring, in the run-up to Cop26.

Developing countries will also look to the US to help direct the tens of billions in additional investment needed every year for the poor world to cut emissions and cope with the impacts of the climate crisis.

Dipti Bhatnagar, international programme coordinator for climate justice and energy at Friends of the Earth International, said: “The US’s refusal to accept and address the high level of responsibility it bears for the climate crisis, and encouragement of high-carbon lifestyles, has resulted in untold suffering for women, men and children throughout the developing world. Droughts are destroying crops, cyclones are levelling homes, and whole nations are literally disappearing.

“The livelihoods and dignity of billions of people who didn’t create the climate crisis require the Biden administration to take immediate and far-reaching climate action driven by justice, equity and science.”