Open letter to the President of the United States concerning his position on climate change

Mr Trump,

Until now, I didn´t care about you and your politics. All the things you did (immigration ban, deregulation of financial markets, tax reductions for the richest people) affected only the United States. But recently you made a statement which is a threat not only for all American people but even more for every living thing on planet earth. In the following lines I´d like to address my thoughts of the decision of the US to withdraw from the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.

One of your promises during the presidential campaign had been to create jobs. With the decision to continue burning fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas you will only maintain a few thousand jobs but kill millions of current and future jobs within the renewable energy area. Instead of accelerating the process towards clean energy and sustainable agriculture you prefer to maintain the status quo of dinosaur technologies which harm our global environment and create enormous wealth for only a few people.

You stated at the press conference, that the Paris agreement would decimate jobs in manufacturing and automotive industry. This is going to happen anyway. Firstly, the already happening digitalization will replace millions of jobs in this industries by robots and algorithms – because they are cheaper, more efficient and will allow these companies to gain bigger revenues. Secondly, the millennial generation is shifting away from consumerism and possessing things. We are already sharing apartments, cars and working tools. Hardly anybody of my generation is having aspirations to get a huge car or stupid weapons.

Furthermore, you were also accusing China and India to build new coal plants and their burden of the Paris Agreement is not as high as the one of America. This is fake news. This two countries are leading in terms on new financial investments in clean energy technology. In 2015 they were responsible for nearly 50 % of all global investments in PV and Wind power plants. They are not only doing this because they want to provide their people with clean energy and clean air, but they know how to calculate and create domestic wealth. The prices of PV modules, wind mills and batteries have fallen tremendously in the last years – and will continue to fall. At the same time it is economically not feasible anymore to profitable run a coal power plant. Even if you think climate change is a hoax or an invention of the Chinese – don´t you think your people in the US should have the right to live in cities with clean air and clear drinking water?

The States are the second biggest polluter in the world after China. This is just the case, because China had become the global manufacturing power house in recent years. If you would consider the consumed products “Made in China” (f.e. Apple iPhone) in the US emissions calculation, you would come to a clear conclusion – America first! It is just not acceptable to consume way more than any other country in the world and don´t take responsibility for the environmental damage at the same time. Of course the US have to pay more money for the Green Climate Fund. You are the biggest national economy in the world and this economy has been fuelled by cheap energy resources like coal for more than 100 years. Developing countries also have the right to create wealth which is inevitably linked to access to finance and energy. It´s time to give back and not to take more. This is the same case for us here in Europe by the way. With your decision to leave the Paris Agreement you are pretty much alone in the world. There are only two other countries (Nicaragua, Syria) which are not committed to keep the global temperature rise below 2° C until the year 2100.

You also claim that the tax payers would suffer from the Paris Agreement. First of all, if you would pay taxes as you should, the burden for the whole society would be already a little bit lower. Additionally, it is true that energy prices would be rising in the short term, but if enough renewable generation capacity would be installed, than energy would be nearly free due to nearly zero marginal costs of these technologies. You refuse to pay a few billion dollars for the Green Climate Fund but keep spending more than 600 billion dollars annually for the military. This is the real reason why American tax payers are suffering Donald.

I´m still confident that the global transition towards clean energy will happen despite your incredibly stupid decision. The financial industry has the goal to be sustainable which means to stay in business. That is the reason why they are going to invest in profitable technologies. Furthermore, nearly every other country on this planet is switching towards renewables, which will have enormous scaling effects and make this technology even cheaper. The question is only if we as a global community will make it in time or if it will be too late until then.

Only six month after you became president of the United States you never had been closer to reach your goal – make America great again. Only one little thing is missing and you have achieved it. Probably, never in American history it had been easier to relief billions of people in the world and hundreds of millions in your country with only one signature – the signature under your resignation. It had been interesting and intense six month (which feel like 6 years already) but it´s time to leave the stage mister president. Please resign and make this beautiful country great again.

Thank you.