President Joe Biden is scheduled to meet with foreign leaders on Thursday to discuss climate change, and during that time, he will announce new funding to speed up the transition to a more sustainable global energy system.
President Biden will declare that the United States will contribute $1 billion to the Green Climate Fund at the Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate (MEF) meeting. This fund supports low-carbon and climate-resilient initiatives in underdeveloped nations.
The White House has released a fact sheet stating that President Biden would ask Congress for $500 million to fund anti-deforestation efforts in Brazil over the next five years. However, it is not uncommon for Congress to reject a president’s request for budgetary funding.
According to the fact sheet, the United States will announce “critical new steps” to improve the management of domestic forests, but the nature of these steps is not specified. It sounds good while absent of specifics, as many declarations do.
The President will also plea to other countries, pushing them to take action on specific policy areas like electric vehicles and their overall goals.
By 2030, Joe Biden hopes to see sales of electric vehicles make up at least 30 percent of the market for medium-duty cars and 50 percent for light-duty vehicles worldwide.
The president has set a domestic goal of achieving a 50% market share for electric vehicles by 2030. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has suggested climate legislation that could be even more ambitious than its prior recommendations. If enacted, the EPA estimates that 60% of new light-duty vehicles sold in the United States will be electric vehicles by the model year 2030.
About 80% of global GDP and greenhouse gas emissions come from MEF member countries, making them primarily responsible for combating climate change.
