Biden's return to Paris pact just a first step for U.S. climate action

(Reuters, 21 Jan 2021) Hopes are high that Joe Biden will kickstart U.S. involvement in global climate diplomacy and set an ambitious 2030 target to cut his country's planet-heating emissions.

As Joe Biden led the United States back into the Paris Agreement on climate change, after taking office Wednesday, diplomats and green groups breathed a collective sigh of relief - before urging him to step up cuts to U.S. emissions.

Soon after his inauguration, Biden signed an executive order, among others, to begin rejoining the 2015 climate pact, reversing a decision by climate-change skeptic Donald Trump.

The process to re-enter the international accord takes a month, meaning the United States will only officially have been out of the deal for a short time, since exiting in November.

But Trump's hostility to the U.N. climate process and his support for polluting fossil fuels have left Biden's team a lot of catching up to do at home and abroad, policy analysts said.

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Reuters, 21 Jan 2021: Biden's return to Paris pact just a first step for U.S. climate action