Who is the Environmental Defense? What is our history? How do we fit into the environmental community in the U.S. and around the world? What role has EDF played in the several climate change policies that Trump proposes to rollback and what we are doing to fight back?


Trump’s policies and his team of climate deniers

The seminar will discuss where Trump’s opposition to action on climate comes from. We will discuss the Trump appointments to key environmental ministries, especially Scott Pruitt, the Administrator of the Environmental Protections, as well as positions and what their backgrounds are. The discussion will note the few members of the administration who believe climate change is real and that the U.S. has an obligation to act to prevent climate catastrophe and how we can mobilize the knowledge of these people to prevent climate catastrophe.

What is Trump Proposing?
Trump has undertaken a broad attack on climate action. The actions include eliminating the Clean Power, the regulations that established to reduce CO2 from coal power plants by 31% by 2030. He has proposed to eliminate all the climate programs at both the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy. He is trying to make large cuts in the budgets of the EPA and DOE and at other agencies doing climate science. Trump said during the campaign that we would withdraw from the Paris Accord, but since taking office has been equivocal about Paris. He says also that he may repeal fuel economy standards for automobiles that have led to worldwide reduction in CO2 per mile traveled from the transportation sector.

The talk will spend some detail discussion is what can Trump do on his own, what will require rulemaking and what will require legislation. We will want to give our perspective on what is the likely outcome of these proposals.

What Progress Can Be Made during the Trump term – regardless of what Trump says or tries to do. Clean energy is growing exponentially in the U. S and Trump and while Trump can slow progress, he will not be able to defeat either the technologies or market progress. Also, many states and cities and many U.S. corporations are vowing to stay the course of climate progress. What are some of those commitments and how valuable are they.


What Can Europe Do to keep the U.S. Moving Forward on Climate.

We will propose a number of ways that Europe can partner with U.S. states, cities, and corporations to reduce greenhouse emissions. We will propose a partnership between U.S. and European NGO’s. One of the most important parts of the session will be some proposals about how Europe can push back against Trump to protect Paris and other climate policies that are under threat. We also will discuss what is important to preserve, so that after Trump leaves office, we can quickly make up some of the lost time on climate.