The US doesn't have a climate policy now — until Washington is back at the global table, world environmental progress will be slow: Noah Kaufman

Time of India

23-04-2025

Noah Kaufman is Senior Research Scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy, School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University. Speaking to Srijana Mitra Das, he discusses America's new ecological aims:
Q. What is the core of your research?
A. I am an economist and focus on energy and climate policy as well as their inter sections with economic policy. For some time now, I've been researching communities around the United States which are heavily dependent on fossil fuels to fund public services and provide jobs. I've been working on viable economic strategies for these communities as the world transitions away from fossil fuels.
Q. Can you explain the surprising US turn towards coal though?
A. All the rhetoric from the federal government these days is certainly about moving back to fossil fuels — including, as per the recent executive order on this, coal. So far, this is just rhetoric though — actual data in the US shows two decades of declining coal production and use. The biggest reason is economic — we have natural gas and renewables which are much lower-cost and cleaner. This combination — economics with environmental regulations — caused a gradual transition away from coal. There are still cultural drivers though.
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In the Appalachian region, whch encompasses West Virginia, eastern Kentucky, etc., there is a long history of coal being central to local economies, jobs, electricity systems and ways of life. However, those are relatively small pockets — around 25 counties in the country produce 75% of the entire coal in the US. Still, this is a cultural issue which also resonates with President
Donald Trump
's base — in his first term too, he announced big measures with fanfare and coal miners standing behind him. However, the data thereafter also shows the decline of coal at a similar pace as under Presidents Obama and then Biden.
Yet, coal's centrality in some places can't be downplayed — in certain areas, as coal mines close, elementary schools shut down because
tax revenue
declines.
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Q. Why have you written earlier of oil and gas communities being a 'blind spot' in America's climate policies?
A. I was talking then of President Biden's administration which had taken strong steps to spur the energy transition in the US. Regarding coal communities, it was acknowledged that if we continue rapidly decarbonising, coal would decline even more, causing further economic issues. So, the Biden administration took measures to address this, including economic deve-lopment grants for these groups.
However, oil and gas communities actually face an 'out of sight, out of mind' situation because they are seen as doing much better than coal — oil and gas production are at an all-time high in the US. We are the leading global producers of both fuels and economically, oil and gas-dependent counties have outperformed the national economy. Most politicians aren't looking into the future of a decarbonised world and thinking of these communities. My research was a call to ensure policies are planned now, so these groups don't end up suffering the same fate as coal communities today.
Q. How would you define America's climate policies now? A. At the federal level, the US has no climate policy today — we have some incentives left over from previous legislation, like the Inflation Reduction Act.
A. The fate of those is yet to be determined. Congress is controlled by Republicans and they may get rid of these. Federal agencies may not be incentivised to implement them. The department of energy is led by Secretary Chris Wright, formerly CEO of an oil and gas company. Many of President Trump's advisors are heavy supporters of fossil fuels. So, currently, we don't have a broad climate policy at the federal level — what we have are subnational actors, states, regions and companies, at work.
Q. How could President Trump's tariff war impact the clean energy transition?
A. The main effect will be to raise prices and serve as a drag on economies, including the US — that will slow the energy transition as lowered economic growth means pullbacks in investments. We are already seeing a pullback in wind, solar and battery manufacturing plants. If the US enters a recession, those will deepen. Of course, the Biden administration also placed tariffs on some green technologies from China but that was part of a strategy to build a US solar manufacturing base — that doesn't seem like a goal shared by the Trump administration.
Q. Experts suggest an obstructionist US exiting
global climate agreements
could be positive — how do you analyse that?
A. The world could make some progress — everything developed in China is at an entirely different scale now while Europe's always been ahead of the US on climate action. However, the amount and pace of progress will be limited if the world's largest economy — and the greatest historical emitter of greenhouse gases — won't act. If other nations see the US abdicating its climate role — in a situation it is most responsible for making — they might not want to make sacrifices either. Until the US is back at the climate table, I'd keep my expectations for global progress in check.
Views expressed are personal