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US President Donald Trump eliminated more than 70 climate and green energy initiatives in his first week of office, launching a sweeping and aggressive move to dismantle Joe Biden’s climate and industrial legacy.
Trump’s executive orders upended federal commitments, initiatives and targets aimed at combating climate change, limiting oil and gas development and accelerating the clean energy buildout, a Financial Times analysis of the new president’s first week of executive orders found.
Among the largest rescissions included ending the ban on new offshore drilling and removing the US from the Paris climate agreement and other commitments under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. He also terminated federal offices dedicated to climate and environmental justice, and paused the disbursement of hundreds of billions of funds from his predecessor’s signature industrial policies.
Federal targets to decarbonise the country’s electricity sector by 2035, make half of US car sales electric by 2030 and reduce emissions at federal agencies have also been eliminated.
Climate and energy experts said Trump’s policy agenda delivered on the wishes of the fossil fuel executives that helped fund his campaign and, if implemented, would severely undermine US efforts to tackle the climate crisis, build a green economy and bring down energy prices.
“It’s taking a slash and burn approach that is going to backfire,” said Alys Campaigne, climate initiative leader at the Southern Environmental Law Center, an environmental non-profit.
“You can rescind these orders, but it doesn’t make the problem go away . . . We’re fundamentally losing out on economic opportunity as we’re watching China and Europe outcompete us on technologies of the future.”
Harrison Fields, Trump’s principal deputy press secretary, said the president won a “decisive mandate” from the American people and is “fully committed to investing in the priorities that voters overwhelmingly supported”.
Biden vowed to put climate at the centre of his term, rejoining the Paris climate agreement, and signing into law the Inflation Reduction Act, the most significant action the US has taken to address the climate crisis. The law transformed the country overnight into a top destination for clean energy investment, offering $370bn in federal incentives to support companies.
Within hours of taking office, Trump signed several executive orders to “unleash” the country’s oil and gas production.
The FT tracked about a dozen Biden executive orders that have been entirely reversed, including orders to protect the environment, address climate-related financial risk, prioritise climate change in foreign policy, and strengthen the country’s leadership in clean transport.
The rescissions ended a Biden administration pause on permits for liquefied natural gas terminals, lifted restrictions on Arctic drilling, and reversed the withdrawal of a permit for the controversial Keystone XL pipeline.
“Most of the rescissions . . . reflect just the 180 degree turn away from climate change as a governing priority towards one of, as the president describes it, energy dominance,” said Chris Treanor, a partner at law firm Akin.
Climate experts said many of Trump’s orders match requests outlined in the American Petroleum Institute’s five-point policy road map published before the election, including opening public lands and water to drilling and lifting a pause on approving new LNG terminals.
Mike Sommers, chief executive of API, said in an interview that its early lobbying work meant it was “well positioned” to influence policy and it is now working hard to ensure its implementation.
The sweeping overhaul underscores the legal vulnerability of Biden’s climate legacy, which relied on executive orders amid a deeply divided Congress. Lawyers say some Trump actions could spur legal challenges, particularly regarding a pause on hundreds of billions of green funds appropriated by Congress.
Jim Bowe, a partner at King & Spalding, warned the pause could send a negative signal about the future use of federal policies to drive private investment.
He said: “It’s going to make it more difficult when a future administration actually wants to try to incentivise behaviour by providing government support to persuade people that government support will be durable.”
(The FT Trump Tracker on climate/energy actions is published here)
