The UK must ramp up its efforts to produce renewable energy and take action on climate change, Ed Miliband has said in the wake of Donald Trump’s re-election as president of the United States.
It comes ahead of an increasingly uncertain global summit on the climate crisis, which has been rocked by cancellations and overshadowed by the election of a climate-sceptic president.
Speaking on the eve of Cop29, the energy secretary said the government is committed to accelerating climate action in what is an increasingly uncertain world.
“The only way to keep the British people secure today is by making Britain a clean-energy superpower, and the only way we protect future generations is by working with other countries to deliver climate action,” Mr Miliband told The Observer.
“This government is committed to accelerating climate action precisely because it is by doing this that we protect our country, with energy security, lower bills, and good jobs.”
Mr Trump has repeatedly claimed climate change is a “hoax”, as well as threatening to once again withdraw the US from the Paris climate agreement – something he did in his previous term as president.
Scientists have warned the president-elect’s policies pose a major threat to the planet. Bill Hare, a senior scientist at Climate Analytics, said his election would likely “damage efforts” to keep the world from warming by more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.
“The election of a climate denier to the US presidency is extremely dangerous for the world,” he warned.
Tomer Shalit, co-founder of ClimateView, a global leader in climate action technology, said Trump’s re-election will shift the dynamic on the world stage, arguing that a failure to lead the way on climate action could negatively impact US influence.
“During the previous Trump term, the decrease in federal initiatives meant that a lot of cities and regions stepped up in ambition. The same thing will likely happen this time, meaning that states and cities in America will play a bigger role on the international stage when it comes to moving fast on climate action”, he told The Independent.
“The world is a very different place to what it was eight years ago. The move away from fossil fuels and towards renewables has too much momentum to be stopped. A nuclear plant’s worth of solar panels is being built every day, global investment in clean technology is running at double the size of coal, oil and gas.
“The question is no longer ‘will it happen?’ but instead, ‘how fast?’. And the winners of tomorrow will be those who move the fastest. Countries that decrease speed or stall the transition will become less relevant on the global stage.”
Meanwhile, Laurence Tubiana, chief executive of the European Climate Foundation and a key architect of the Paris Agreement, said while the US election result is a “setback for global climate action”, the Paris Agreement has “proven resilient and is stronger than any single country’s policies”.
“There is powerful economic momentum behind the global transition, which the US has led and gained from, but now risks forfeiting,” she added, urging Europe to lead the way.
“The devastating toll of recent hurricanes was a grim reminder that all Americans are affected by worsening climate change.”
Despite the warnings, this year’s climate summit has been rocked by cancellations from major world leaders.
EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen will stay at home, while German chancellor Olaf Scholz has cancelled his visit following the break-up of his governing coalition.
French president Emmanuel Macron will also stay away from the summit, occupied by a domestic political crisis.
The stark ideological differences between Mr Trump and Sir Keir Starmer have sparked concern about how the government will build bridges with the republican politician’s administration.
Former Labour minister Peter Mandelson has been widely tipped as a potential replacement for current ambassador Karen Pierce, who took the job in 2020, with ministers shooting down offers from Trump-ally Nigel Farage to help “mend fences” with the US administration.
Asked about Mr Farage’s offer to be an unofficial ambassador to the US, chief treasury secretary Darren Jones told Sky News: “I think that’s probably unlikely. He might want to focus his efforts on the constituency of Clacton.”