Essay by Eric Worrall
Apparently buying technology off others will not be a thing in the Guardian / Kerry vision of the future.
‘A colossal own goal’: Trump’s exit from global climate treaties will have little effect outside US
Fiona Harvey and Oliver Milman
For much of the last 30 years, the rest of the world has been forced to persevere with climate action in the face of US intransigence
Donald Trump’s latest attack on climate action takes place amid rapidly rising temperatures, rising sea levels, still-rising greenhouse gas emissions, burgeoning costs from extreme weather and the imminent danger that the world will trigger “tipping points” in the climate system that will lead to catastrophic and irreversible changes.
…
Simon Stiell, the UN’s climate chief, said US citizens and companies would bear the impact. “It is a colossal own goal which will leave the US less secure and less prosperous,” he said. “It will mean less affordable energy, food, transport and insurance for American households and businesses as renewables keep getting cheaper than fossil fuels, as climate-driven disasters hit American crops, businesses and infrastructure harder each year and as oil, coal and gas volatility drives more conflicts, regional instability and forced migration.”
Mohamed Adow, the director of the thinktank Power Shift Africa, predicts countries will take a similar attitude this year, carrying on without the US. “The climate movement is bigger than any one nation,” he said. “African nations and the global south will continue pushing for climate justice, demanding that wealthy polluters honour their historical responsibilities, and building the clean energy future our people deserve.”
…Under Trump, the US risks being left on the sidelines – a position that Kerry called a “gift to China”. The economist Nicholas Stern said: “The economics of the [low-carbon] transition look ever more attractive. Every time we look at the science it looks more worrying, and every time we look at the technology it is more encouraging. In an increasingly insecure world, countries and industries will be seeking independence from fossil fuels and the great volatility such dependence brings. In a world with sluggish growth, countries and industries will be seeking new opportunities. These will be in the technologies of the 21st century, not the 19th and 20th centuries.”
But he noted that Trump, though he could not change the economic direction of travel, could unsettle some investors on the margins. “Any actions that slow down the pace are unhelpful,” he said.
…
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/jan/09/a-colossal-own-goal-trumps-exit-from-global-climate-treaties-will-have-little-effect-outside-us
This claim is so absurd. There is no scenario in which the USA does not gain an economic advantage by pulling out of climate treaties.
Imagine for a moment the climate crisis was as bad as John Kerry and the fantasists at the Guardian believe, and that green energy is the solution. By withdrawing from climate treaties, the USA still gains a significant economic advantage by freeloading off the climate efforts of others. By avoiding the economic disruption of a premature green energy transition, the USA can sit on the sidelines, letting others carry the burden of reducing global CO2 emissions, and use its economic advantage to scoop up any useful green energy technology after the patents run out.
The reality is there is no climate crisis, and green technology will never be useful. In this scenario the USA has an even greater advantage, by avoiding the economic folly of wasting money on technologies which can never fulfil requirements.
Either way Trump’s USA wins.
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