In hottest decade on record, climate change appears nowhere in State of the Union address

In his State of the Union address Tuesday night, President Donald Trump didn’t mention a topic many scientists say will be the defining issue of the 21st century: climate change. The closest the more than hour-long speech came to mentioning global warming was a plug for the One Trillion Trees Initiative, a private-public partnership that aims to plant new trees globally.

Instead, in what critics are calling an indirect rebuke of the whole idea of greenhouse gas-induced global warming, Trump touted America’s growing production of greenhouse gas-producing fossil fuels.

While the president's remarks might not be surprising given his administration's approach to global warming since he took office in 2017, the absence further alarmed scientists already concerned about a lack of action from global leaders at a time when the Earth just finished its hottest decade in the historical record and the second-warmest year.

The United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says “rapid and far-reaching” transitions in energy, industry and transportation will be needed in the next 10 years to keep global temperatures from rising more than 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit.

"The U.S. has an obligation to lead on the great challenges we face as a civilization – with climate change at the very top,” said Michael Mann, a professor of meteorology and director of the Earth System Science Center at Pennsylvania State University in State College, Pennsylvania.

Overall, 86% of Democrats, 55% of Republicans and 78% of independents say they want to reduce the effects of global climate change, a Public Agenda/USA TODAY/Ipsos survey published last month found.

Trump has rolled back at least 95 environmental rules since taking office. In November, Trump also began the process of officially withdrawing the United States from the Paris climate agreement. The landmark agreement, signed by 197 nations, allowed countries to set their own goals to curb heat-trapping gas emissions. The Trump administration called it an "unfair economic burden" on the U.S. economy.

Conservatives say Trump is taking a business-minded approach to the nation's environmental challenges.

"Actions speak louder, and this administration has a clear record on clean energy innovation, from market signals like carbon capture incentives, to historic levels of RD&D investment for breakthrough technologies," said Rich Powell, executive director of ClearPath, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit working to develop advance conservative policies that will accelerate clean energy innovation.

But for the 20% or so of Americans who are passionate about climate change and want government action, Trump's silence was likely a political decision, said Jon Krosnick, who studies American beliefs on climate change at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California.

“By saying nothing, he avoided angering them any more than they are already by his position on the issue. But he also reinforced their impression that this issue is not on his radar screen for future action,” he said.

John Cook, a climate communication researcher at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, said Trump displayed a lack of leadership.

“To tout planting trees as a solution to climate change without any mention of reducing emissions is like feeding poison to a child and when they get a headache, continuing to poison them while giving them an aspirin,” he said.

More trees won't save Earth

In his address, Trump said, “To protect the environment, days ago, I announced that the United States will join the One Trillion Trees Initiative, an ambitious effort to bring together government and the private sector to plant new trees in America and all around the world.”

The Trees plan is an outgrowth of the Billion Tree Campaign launched in 2006 by the United Nations Environment Program. The 1t.org initiative was launched by the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last month.

While somewhat controversial, overall many environmental groups have embraced the initiative in part because trees store carbon dioxide as they grow, thus lowering greenhouse gasses.

However, science shows that trees alone won’t solve the problem.

Currently, U.S. forests are important natural climate solutions that offset roughly 15% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, said Phil Duffy, president of Woods Hole Research Center, a research organization in Falmouth, Massachusetts, that studies climate change impacts and solutions.

“While smart forest management can buy more time to eliminate the use of fossil fuels, it cannot replace emissions reductions. Planting trees, alone, is insufficient to address the climate emergency,” he said.

Time is running out to address climate change

In his speech, Trump also touted the nation’s growing fossil fuel production, saying, “Thanks to our bold regulatory reduction campaign, the United States has become the No. 1 producer of oil and natural gas in the world, by far."

That’s actually been the case since 2013, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, mostly because of the growth of fracking technology.

U.S. petroleum and natural gas production increased by 16% and 12% respectively in 2018 and established a new production record. The U.S. surpassed Russia's production of natural gas in 2011 and Saudia Arabia's production of petroleum in 2018.

But to slow and even reverse global warming, the nation must move beyond fossil fuels entirely, said Phil Duffy, president of Woods Hole Research Center, a research organization in Falmouth, Massachusetts, that studies climate change impacts and solutions.

“To meet the goal of the Paris climate agreement and limit total temperature increase to less than one and a half degrees Celsius, global emissions need to fall by 7.6% each year for the next decade. That is incompatible with increased fossil fuel production,” he said.

The lack of action over the past three years, even as fires raged, temperatures rose and the ice caps melted, is making the problem even harder to fix, say researchers.

“Owing in part to the intransigence of the Trump administration, the world now has to decrease carbon emissions twice as fast as we would have if had we made sufficient progress over the past four years if we are to avert the worst impacts of climate change,” said Mann, the Penn State meteorology professor.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump's State of the Union: No climate change, but talk of trees