Russia and the U.S. Could Be Partners in Climate Change Inaction

Russian President Vladimir Putin, shaking hands with then
 Exxon chief executive Rex Tillerson during a 2013
 ceremony awarding oil company heads and employees,
 now finds himself aligned philosophically with the U.S.
on a lack of enthusiasm for the Paris climate agreement.

As Donald Trump pushes the United States toward inaction on climate change, he is likely to find an ally in Russia.

Russia is the fifth-largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world. Yet the plan it submitted under the Paris agreement to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 is one of the weakest of any government and actually permits Russia to increase carbon pollution over time. 

The Paris agreement went into effect last November, but Russia is the only major emitter that has not ratified it. Instead, it has laid out a timetable that would delay ratification for almost three years.

"Russia will not artificially accelerate the process of ratification of the Paris climate agreement," Russia's special presidential representative on climate, Alexander Bedritsky, said last September.

A new alignment between Russia and a friendlier United States under Trump could slow climate action even more.  Trump denies global warming more nakedly than Russian President Vladimir Putin, who pivoted from years of downplaying climate change to calling it a grave threat in 2015, but has done little to rein in greenhouse gas emissions. 

Russia's sluggishness on climate could bolster the Trump team's plans to abandon climate action, and vice versa.

Read the Inside Climate News story - “Russia and the U.S. Could Be Partners in Climate Change Inaction.”