House Republicans have no faith that other countries will live up to their climate change promises made in the Paris agreement and criticized President Obama on Tuesday for skirting Senate ratification of the deal.
Republicans in the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology lined up to take shots at the climate change deal reached in December. Some questioned whether climate change is really happening, called out Obama’s administration for skirting congressional approval of the deal and cast doubts on other countries’ ability and desire to follow through with their commitments.
“If climate change theory is right, assuming that all other countries comply and don’t cheat, then will we stay equal … in our respective competitive positions,” said Rep. Randy Weber, R-Texas. “But, if the theory is wrong or the countries cheat, not that they would ever do that, the U.S. stands to lose the most.”
The Paris agreement was completed in December and saw 196 countries from around the world come together to try to limit global temperature rise below 2 degrees Celsius.
Most scientists believe mankind is causing climate change through the burning of fossil fuels, releasing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and subsequently causing the globe to warm.
Each country came up with its own plan to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. But the commitments are not legally binding and critics say the deal lacks teeth.
The Paris agreement also contains commitments from rich countries to send money to poorer countries so they can develop more clean energy sources. Those financial commitments are also not legally binding.
The countries agreed to meet every five years to reassess their greenhouse gas reduction commitments with an eye toward ramping up the reductions, if possible.
Steven Groves, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, said non-compliance from other countries is his top concern.
“If the U.S. joined this one and lived up to the letter of its commitments, I wouldn’t be confident that countries like India or China, or developing countries around the world, would find it feasible to live up to their commitments,” he said.
Rep. Bill Posey, R-Fla., said he believed only that the environmental regulations handed down by the Obama administration would drive industry out of the country to places where there are fewer rules.
Posey said he’s talked to cement manufacturers in his home state who said they would be driven away by environmental regulations handed down by the Environmental Protection Agency. They were looking at places like Mexico, he said.
“I don’t think there are environmental regulations of significance in Mexico in cement, so unless you believe in a no-peeing section of a swimming pool, we still get the pollution,” he said. “We just pay 400 percent more for the product.”
Rep. Darin LaHood, R-Ill., blasted the Obama administration for crafting the deal as an executive agreement instead of as a treaty.
Because the most important parts of the deal are not legally binding, they won’t have to go before the Senate. The administration has admitted the deal was written in that manner because they didn’t believe the Senate would ratify the agreement.
LaHood said it’s hypocritical to go around Congress like that.
“It seems incongruent to me that we continually around the world talk about democracy and the Constitution and the system of government we have here, but we are doing this the opposite way here,” he said, “and not going through the treaty process, which is cloaked in the legalities that are binding.”
