Accepting the Democratic nomination for president, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Thursday that, if elected, she would ensure the United States meets its commitments under the Paris Agreement on climate change. “I’m proud that we shaped a global climate agreement – now we have to hold every country accountable to their commitments, including ourselves,” she said Thursday evening, capping off the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
Under the agreement, the U.S. has committed to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions 26-28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025. Washington, though, has not yet formally ratified the accord, though the Obama administration has pledged to do this this year.
Clinton was not involved in negotiations on the accord, the first universal climate change agreement, which was adopted in December at the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties (COP21) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. However, she did play a role in COP15, held in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 2009.
COP15 did not result in the development of the hoped-for international climate change agreement but instead concluded with a nonbinding accord that lacked enough support to be adopted.
Clinton pitched efforts to address climate change as an economic opportunity. “I believe in science. I believe that climate change is real and that we can save our planet while creating millions of good-paying clean energy jobs,” she said in her speech.
Clinton now squares off against Republican nominee Donald Trump in a campaign of just over three months leading to the Nov. 8 election. The billionaire has pledged to revitalize the coal industry and to make the United States energy independent. He has been skeptical of climate change, at times describing at it as a hoax.
Clinton released her energy plan a year ago, calling for installation of more than half a billion solar panels throughout the nation by 2020 and an increase in renewable generation to 33 percent of total national energy output generation by 2027.
She has also developed a plan to revitalize coal communities through a number of measures including developing job retraining programs, incentivizing a transition to clean energy in those communities, reforming a benefit program those who suffer from black lung, and funding research and development into carbon capture and storage. “Hillary Clinton is committed to meeting the climate change challenge as President and making the United States a clean energy superpower. At the same time, she will not allow coal communities to be left behind—or left out of our economic future,” the plan says.
Clinton reaffirmed her commitment to coal communities Thursday evening. “My primary mission as president will be to create more opportunity and more good jobs with rising wages right here in the United States,” she said. “Especially in places that for too long have been left out and left behind, from our inner cities to our small towns, from Indian country to coal country.”