His determination to “drill, baby, drill” is diametrically opposed to the European Green Deal. As one of our expert witnesses puts it inside this issue in our Special Report dedicated to ESG, “Actions are moving rapidly in opposite directions on both sides of the Atlantic. […] Business and political stakeholders are seeking clarity and common ground, observing more conservative economic approaches in climate and energy politics, among other areas.”
This is not the first time Trump has pulled the United States out of the Paris Climate Treaty. He announced the same move when he first came to power in 2017, although it didn’t actually come to pass until November 2020. The now former President Joe Biden took the country right back in, signing an executive order to that effect on his first day in office, January 20, 2021. America will be one of just four states not signed up, the others being a trio you would not often expect to be sharing common ground with the States: Libya, Yemen and Iran.
Viewed from this side of the Pond, the rise and rise of ESG is impossible to ignore. Indeed, certification of it has become an essential qualifier for many investors, especially those involved with the real estate industry. Will either Europe or America gain a competitive advantage from their different approaches? Will one persuade the other that it has the right idea? Might more nations walk away from the Paris deal? Should the EU now seek to prioritize American LNG deliveries as an alternative to cheap Russian gas, which is no longer acceptable to many in the wake of the Russo-Ukraine war? But here’s a thought. Suppose Trump delivers on another of his promises, to end the full-scale invasion Moscow launched on its Western neighbor. Would that suddenly make cheap Russian gas acceptable again, even if Putin used his fossil fuels as a fund to rebuild and reequip his armed forces?
Those are some pretty serious questions, but so is the fact that 2024 was the hottest year on record, and the science doesn’t point to 2025 being markedly cooler. While the United States plays yo-yo with its membership of the climate treaty, the EU appears to be more firmly wedded to its ideals of reducing its greenhouse gas emissions and becoming carbon neutral, a fact that ought to please Hungary, given its increasing dependence on serving the e-mobility markets
Robin Marshall
Editor-in-chief
This editorial was first published in the Budapest Business Journal print issue of January 24, 2025.
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