With the beginning of the second Donald Trump Presidency in 2024, addressing the reduction of U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions which are the main drivers of climate change and global warming, has politically been greatly diminished in the U.S., with President Trump and most of his fellow Republicans in Congress pushing for much greater extraction of fossil fuels, oil, natural gas, and coal, as well as deliberately fighting efforts to expand renewable energy production, namely wind and solar power. President Trump also nixed the incentives to buy electric vehicles, via tax credits. President Trump again for the second time pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, when 194 countries are party to the agreement and its voluntary limits on greenhouse gas emissions.
President Trump said at the United Nations in 2025,according to PBS, "This 'climate change,' it's the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world, in my opinion… If you don't get away from this green scam, your country is going to fail."
Given that American voters elected to the Presidency in 2024 a climate change skeptic of the tallest order, it is relevant to review the basic facts and science that explain why human combustion of fossil fuels and its resulting carbon dioxide pollution is truly warming our planet and contributing to climate change. With 2024 achieving the status of the planet’s “warmest year on record” with global average surface temperature of 1.55 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, according to the World Meteorological Organization, we should also look at what the U.S. should ideally be doing to combat global warming and its resulting effects on climate and whether it should join the other wealthy or large nations around the world in efforts to reduce their GHG emissions.
According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA), “We know [global warming] is largely caused by human activities because the key role that carbon dioxide plays in maintaining
Earth’s natural greenhouse effect has been understood since the mid-1800s.
Unless it is offset by some equally large cooling influence, more atmospheric
carbon dioxide will lead to warmer surface temperatures. Since 1800, the amount
of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased from about 280 parts per
million (ppm) to 410 ppm in 2019. We know from…its rapid increase…that the
source of this new carbon dioxide is fossil fuels, and not natural sources like
forest fires, volcanoes, or outgassing from the ocean.”
Greenhouse gases warm the planet by trapping heat in our atmosphere, according to Columbia Climate School, “When sunlight reaches Earth, the surface absorbs some of the light’s energy and reradiates it as infrared waves, which we feel as heat…Carbon dioxide…absorbs energy at a variety of wavelengths between 2,000 and 15,000 nanometers — a range that overlaps with that of infrared energy. As CO2 soaks up this infrared energy, it vibrates and re-emits the infrared energy back in all directions. About half of that energy goes out into space, and about half of it returns to Earth as heat, contributing to the ‘greenhouse effect.’”
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) contributes: “There is unequivocal evidence that Earth is warming at an
unprecedented rate. Human activity is the principal cause.”
The effects of worsening climate change are seen in larger
wildfires, massive floods, stronger monsoon rains, punishing heat waves,
stronger tropical cyclones and hurricanes, as well as droughts. Global warming
is causing the warming of the oceans, which cover 70 percent of planet Earth
and absorb much of the heat produced from global warming, with “the top 2,300 feet of the global ocean [warming] about 1.5°F since 1901,”
according to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
And global warming is causing the melting of polar ice and glaciers, which can
contribute to rising sea levels. According to National Geographic, polar ice
melt has raised “average global sea level between four and eight inches (10 and
20 centimeters) in the past hundred years, according to the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).”
Humans combusting fossil fuels to produce electricity, power
industry, and drive our cars and trucks and their resulting emissions of
greenhouse gases into the atmosphere is driving this global warming and thus,
climate change.
Globally, Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Emissions – which include carbon dioxide, methane,
nitrous oxide, and some other chemicals – have continued to increase yearly to 53.2
billion tons CO2 equivalent in 2024, according to the European Commission’s
EDGAR database.
Carbon Dioxide makes up about 75% of those emissions, while methane makes up 17.3% - and methane has much greater warming potential than CO2.
According to the European Commission’s Edgar database, China,
the United States, India, the European Union, Russia and Indonesia are the
world's largest GHG emitters. Together they account for 61.8% of global GHG
emissions. In 2024 China, India, Russia and Indonesia increased their GHG emissions
compared to 2023. Total Global GHG emissions increased by 1.3% compared to 2023.
Total GHG Emissions by Country – European Commission - Edgar
China 15,536.10 Million Tonnes CO2
equivalent
U.S. 5,890.99 Million Tonnes CO2 equivalent
India 4,371.17 Million Tonnes CO2 equivalent
EU 3,164.66 Million Tonnes CO2 equivalent
Russia 2,575.65
Million Tonnes CO2 equivalent
Indonesia 1,323.78
Million Tonnes CO2 equivalent
So, while the U.S. is still a huge emitter of greenhouse gases, the good news is that U.S. GHG emissions have declined steadily since about the year 2007. This is largely due to a turn away from using coal to generate electricity and substituting it with natural gas in highly efficient power generators, which generate considerably less carbon dioxide pollution. That’s because coal contains much more carbon than natural gas and oil.
However, the U.S. is still one of the leaders in the world in GHG emissions per capita, with GHG emissions of 17.34 tonnes CO2 equivalent
per person in 2024, compared to per capita emissions of 7.14 tonnes for the EU,
10.81 tonnes for China, 3.04 tonnes for India, 4.69 tonnes for Indonesia, and
18.02 tonnes for Russia.
However, U.S. responsibility for the current state of global warming is much greater than the table of total GHG emissions above would suggest because carbon dioxide remains in our atmosphere for a very long time – between 5 and 200 years (though much of it is absorbed by the oceans, which is discussed in this article, Carbon is Forever, in Nature Climate Change) - so historical U.S. GHG emissions are a very relevant statistic. The U.S. is the greatest historical emitter of GHGs, releasing more than 509 billion tons CO2 since 1850, or 20% of the total. China is a relatively distant second, with 11%, followed by Russia with 7%, Brazil 5%, Germany 4%, Indonesia 4%, and the UK 3%.
So, what should be done about our human contribution to
global warming, and climate change, through our combustion of fossil fuels?
The Paris Agreement on Climate, entered into force in 2016,
aims to “substantially reduce global greenhouse gas emissions to hold the global
temperature increase to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels and pursue
efforts to limit it to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, recognizing that this
would significantly reduce the risks and impacts of climate change.”
United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change argues that crossing the 1.5°C threshold risks unleashing far more severe climate change impacts, including more frequent and severe droughts, heat waves and rainfall.
In the Paris agreement, countries submit their voluntary
Nationally Determined Contributions of GHG emissions, which began in 2020.
China, the world’s second largest economy and largest emitter
of GHGs, is wholeheartedly committed to the Paris Agreement’s goals and has
taken a leadership role in the fight against climate change. China calls
Climate Change a “grim challenge facing all mankind”, and asserts, “we must
never relax our efforts to tackle climate change.”
China’s goals as laid out in its NDC report states this
country of 1.4 billion people will, unlike the current pro-fossil fuel policies
of the Trump Administration, heavily invest in wind and solar power to reduce
GHG emissions. China “will lower its CO2 emissions per unit of gross domestic
product (GDP) by over 65% from the 2005 level, increase the share of non-fossil
fuels in primary energy consumption to around 25%, increase the forest stock
volume by 6 billion cubic meters from the 2005 level, and bring its total
installed capacity of wind and solar power to over 1.2 billion kW.”
China aims to have CO2 emissions peak before 2030 and
achieve carbon neutrality before 2060.
(From, “China’s
Achievements, New Goals and New Measures for Nationally Determined
Contributions”)
Carbon neutrality is where a country’s GHG emissions are offset by natural carbon sinks, such as forests, the oceans, and soil, and
could also be augmented by carbon-capture technologies. The European Union aims
to be carbon-neutral by 2050.
To achieve these climate goals, China has engaged in massive
investment in solar and wind power.
According to the International Energy Agency, “In 2024 China’s clean energy investment was more than $625 billion, almost doubling since 2015. China also achieved its 2030 wind and solar capacity target in 2024, six years ahead of schedule.”
According to this article in The Guardian, in 2025, “Between January and May, China added 198 GigaWatts of solar and 46 GigaWatts of wind,
enough to generate as much electricity as Indonesia or Turkey.”
The European Union, another signatory to the Paris
Agreement, has also been heavily investing in wind and solar renewable energy. “In 2024, renewable energy sources accounted for 47.5% of gross electricity consumption in the EU, indicating a 2.1 percentage points increase from 2023,” according
to the EU. 38% of those renewable energy
sources are wind power, while 23.4% are solar power.
Of the world’s largest emitters of GHGs, India, Russia, and Indonesia also all signed the Paris Agreement, have made commitments to reduce their GHG emissions, and are investing in renewable energy. According to the IEA, “ In 2024, 83% of power sector investment [in India] went to clean energy.”
Despite a Trump Administration openly hostile to renewable energy, “Renewable energy production [in the U.S.] grew by 3% from 2024 to a new record, the fifth consecutive year of growth. Solar and wind both set records for energy production as new generators came online,”according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Still, renewable energy in the U.S. made up only 9 percent of total energy consumed in 2023.
Has the U.S. become a rogue climate nation under President Donald Trump for being the only major economy and one of the largest emitters of GHGs to deny the global warming crisis and to abandon the Paris Agreement? When all other major emitters have joined the climate agreement, acknowledging the scientific reality of global warming and its impact on climate and agreeing to reduce emissions. Did American voters truly desire this abandonment of efforts to reduce GHG emissions in the fight against global warming, and a radical political turn to the encouragement of greater production and use of oil, coal, and natural gas, when they elected Donald Trump President in 2024?
According to a 2025 poll by The University of Chicago and The Associated Press–NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, only 52% of respondents think climate change is human-driven, including 35% of Republicans and 67% of Democrats. 47% of respondents think climate change policy is very important (compared to 80% who think healthcare policy and 78% who think the economic policy is very important). 60% think the U.S. should take a more active role in global climate efforts. 41% said they support incentives to purchase electric vehicles. Only 42% of respondents support expanding oil and gas production and only 18% support auctioning off public land for oil drilling.
According to a 2026 Gallup Poll, 64% of respondents think that global warming is caused by pollution from human activities, with 33% thinking the changes in the climate are natural.
These poll numbers suggest that most Americans did not want this radical turn to encouraging greater fossil fuel use, the hostility to renewable energy, or leaving the Paris
Agreement. What America needs is a concerted effort by politicians, the
news media, and organizations to educate the public about GHG emissions, their
contribution to global warming and climate change.
The NY Times published a guest essay recently, titled “Democrats Don’t Have to Campaign on Climate Change Anymore,” which in my opinion gets its all wrong. While the opinion argues that most Democrat voters already support efforts to mitigate global warming and are solidly in the Democratic camp, campaigning on the issue of climate change is just going to alienate independent and swing voters who prioritize other issues like the economy, affordability, and health insurance over climate change. But this reasoning ignores the value political candidates can contribute to the public debate on an issue of paramount importance. It’s really the responsibility of these political candidates to educate prospective voters about the U.S.’ contribution to GHG emissions, those emissions' role in causing global warming, the fact that all major emitter countries have joined and committed to the Paris Agreement. Politicians should tell prospective voters that those other countries are making an effort to reduce their GHG emissions, and discuss the fact that the US has become a rogue climate nation for abandoning the Paris Agreement and our responsibility of acknowledging our very significant contribution to global warming.
With 2024 being the warmest year on record, according to the
World Meteorological Organization, with an average global temperature of 1.55
degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, the planet has exceeded the warming
goal established by the Paris Agreement, which aims to keep warming to 1.5
degrees C. Our world needs to get very serious about reducing GHG emissions to prevent
the worst effects of global warming in the years to come and our world and our planet need the United States, the world’s biggest economy, and the 2nd largest emitter of GHGs, to accept the responsibility to
join the global effort to do so.
David Fine
Freelance Writer
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