The Paris climate agreement is dead — time to bury it for good

The Paris climate agreement was doomed to fail from its inception. It is long past time for all parties involved, as well as the media, to acknowledge this fact.

The mainstream media has lamented the Paris agreement’s fate since President Donald Trump’s re-election. Trump withdrew the United States from the agreement during his first term and vowed to do so again after Joe Biden rejoined it. While Trump’s withdrawal was a public rebuke that undermined the pact’s “effectiveness,” the agreement was effectively dead before the ink on the last signature was dry.

China’s rising emissions since 2015 all but guarantee that global CO2 levels will continue climbing through 2030 and beyond, no matter what other nations do.

The structure of the agreement itself ensured that it would be ineffective in preventing greenhouse gas emissions from rising.

As I noted shortly after its completion in 2015, even the architects of the Paris agreement quietly admitted that the emissions pledges made by signatory countries would fall short of limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius. At the time, their own estimates showed that if every nation fulfilled its commitment, the combined result would still account for less than half the greenhouse gas reductions needed to meet the 2-degree goal.

By 2017, the United Nations confirmed this shortfall. Its report projected that even if every country fully complied with its Paris agreement targets — an optimistic scenario — global temperatures would still rise by 3 degrees Celsius by 2100.

The agreement’s prospects have only worsened since. As the BBC has reported, several countries openly acknowledge that they will not meet their commitments. Nations such as Argentina, Indonesia, South Africa, and South Korea — all signatories that previously pledged to curb fossil fuel use — now plan to increase the production of coal, natural gas, and oil. Many also hope to import additional fuel from the United States.

These nations are now blaming Trump for their decision, but the data shows that every single country now seeking more fossil fuels had already increased its use long before Trump was re-elected and withdrew from the Paris agreement. In fact, no country that set specific emissions reduction targets in the first Paris commitment period has made significant progress toward meeting its goals.

What’s more, of the nearly 200 countries that signed the agreement, only 10 submitted their updated carbon reduction commitments by the deadline — meaning 190 nations failed to comply. Even the 10 countries that submitted their updated commitments failed to meet their previous targets.

Two of the world’s three largest carbon dioxide emitters — China and India — have made no firm commitments under the Paris agreement. Instead of pledging to reduce emissions, both countries offered vague assurances that they expect emissions to peak eventually. If carbon dioxide truly drives climate change, China’s rising emissions since 2015 all but guarantee that global CO2 levels will continue climbing through 2030 and the 2050, no matter what other nations do.

As Thomas Hobbes wrote, “Covenants, without the sword, are but words, and of no strength to secure a man at all.” Every climate agreement to date has embodied that idea — unenforceable promises with no mechanism to guarantee compliance.

The fact is that the Paris agreement was never a binding treaty. Countries set their own emissions targets, but the agreement included no international enforcement. Unless countries pass laws domestically to formalize their pledges, those goals remain legally meaningless — even within their own borders.

Ultimately, the Paris agreement demands long-term sacrifice without any clear or measurable benefit. Politicians focused on re-election hesitate to adopt policies that visibly harm their constituents today in exchange for hypothetical rewards decades after they’ve left office. That political reality is why the Paris climate agreement was doomed from the start. Now is the time to acknowledge its failure — without regret. The trillions already spent are sunk costs, but at the very least, we can stop wasting more.