EPA chief cites flawed NYT column to justify Trump’s exit from Paris deal

Joe Romm/Think Progress

At the daily White House press briefing on Friday, one day after the Trump administration withdrew the U.S. from the Paris climate agreement, Press Secretary Sean Spicer handed the podium to EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. Pruitt then ably provided the kind of nonstop falsehoods and misinformation the press and public have come to expect.

Pruitt said he didn’t know why people call him a “climate denier,” and then proceeded to quote and misquote Bret Stephens — the New York Times’ new columnist who has been widely criticized for spreading misinformation on climate change — as a basis for denying basic climate science.

Here’s the video, in which Pruitt tries to defend President Donald Trump’s catastrophic decision to exit the Paris climate deal:

First, Pruitt says some people call him a “climate denier,” but adds, “I don’t even know what it means to deny the climate.”

“Climate denier” is a shorthand for someone who rejects the well-established science of climate change. If you want to know why people call you a climate (science) denier, keep reading.

Pruitt then starts to quote from “Climate of Complete Certainty,” a recent column written by Stephens in the New York Times. That column, along with those that followed, was widely debunked by climate scientists and others weeks ago.

But here’s the most stunning aspect of that. The “very important quote,” as Pruitt called it, is actually a misquote: Pruitt eliminated the portion where Stephens, widely viewed as a climate misinformer, said the fact that the planet has warmed is “indisputable.”

Here is the key part of what Pruitt quotes (emphasis added):

“Anyone who has read the 2014 report of the IPCC knows that, while the modest 0.85 degrees Celsius warming of the earth has occurred since 1880, much else that passes as accepted fact is really a matter of probabilities….”

Except that’s not what Stephens wrote, as you can see at the New York Times website:

“Anyone who has read the 2014 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change knows that, while the modest (0.85 degrees Celsius, or about 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit) warming of the earth since 1880 is indisputable, as is the human influence on that warming, much else that passes as accepted fact is really a matter of probabilities….”

Yes, without informing the press or the public who were listening, Pruitt simply misquoted and rewrote the part where Stephens said the 1.5°F (0.85°C) warming since 1880 is “indisputable, as is the human influence on that warming.”

Stephens’ line is full of factual errors in itself. Indeed, dozens of scientists signed a letter debunking Stephens, and the Times even issued a correction for most egregious of his errors in that sentence.

But in his desperation to justify his boss’ unjustifiable decision, EPA chief Scott Pruitt can’t even bring himself to admit what Stephens admits — that both global warming and the human influence on that warming is “indisputable.”

So the man in charge of all environmental policy for this country can’t even utter the words conceded by a professional “climate change bullshitter,” as Vox labeled Stephens. Pruitt has more than earned the title “climate denier.”

Trump’s argument for withdrawing from Paris agreement contains multi-trillion dollar math error

Samantha Page/Think Progress

President Donald Trump announced Thursday that the United States would abandon the Paris climate agreement, but his justification for withdrawing was rooted in a false economic claim.

Trump claimed that U.S. commitments under the Paris accord would cost the country’s GDP $3 trillion, but the report he took that estimate from “does not take into account potential benefits from avoided emissions.”

In other words: The study did not account for any benefits of participating in a global plan to avoid the worst effects of climate change. It is a report on climate mitigation that ignores climate change. The report also does not consider the economic benefits to renewable energy industries, nor does it consider the health costs that are associated with fossil fuel pollution.

Frankly, this analysis in line with Trump’s previously articulated positions on climate change and the economy. He does not believe that climate change exists (he has famously called it a hoax perpetuated by China), and he believes that rolling back environmental regulations will help the economy.

These positions fly in the face of established science and history. For starters, climate change is happening. It is happening right now. It is happening because of the rise in greenhouse gas emissions from human activity. In addition, history has shown time and time again that protecting the environment is good for the economy — and for people, who drink water and breathe and also live in houses by the ocean.

The report Trump cited, released by NERA Consulting, is extreme. Even the conservative Heritage Foundation estimated less cost from the Paris agreement than the NERA report.

Meanwhile, non-partisan reports offer dire warnings for not addressing climate change. Earlier this year, researchers at the University of California Berkeley found that “unmitigated, climate change could reduce global GDP by over 20 percent by 2100.”

A 2015 report from Cambridge University’s Judge Business School found thatthe “present value of the damage caused by human-caused climate change from a moderate warming scenario is an astonishing $400 trillion.”

The same year, a report from Citibank found that not addressing climate change will cost $44 trillion by 2060, while investing in low-carbon energy would save $1.8 trillion through 2040, as compared to a business-as-usual scenario.