Commentary on the US plan to reduce carbon emissions

President Obama's plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions may look like a climate victory, writes Tim Kruger - but it's no such thing. It's feeble because the US can meet its targets by reducing emissions to 2030 more slowly than it has since 2000. And it's fragile as any future President can scrap it at will.
Climate change-denying Republicans hate this plan (of course), therefore all good climate realists see it as a triumph. But it is a tiny, tiny step in the right direction and climatically immaterial.
No doubt, you heard the good news. Barack Obama has announced the US is pushing through plans to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. Rejoice! Rejoice! We've got this climate problem licked - hurrah!

Hold the champagne - and not just because it's full of bubbles of carbon dioxide - while we do a reality check. This is a distinctly underwhelming development. Let's pick apart the spin from the reality.
First, the way the story has been told - the US commits to a 32% reduction in emissions of greenhouse gases by 2030. This is being pushed through by tightening the rules governed by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) - a federal agency that the US president can instruct, without the need to get past those pesky filibusterers in the dysfunctional, Republican-dominated houses of Congress. The EPA is confident that its rules have a firm legal footing and will be able to withstand the inevitable court challenges.
The effect of the rules will be to clobber the production of electricity using coal. This is certainly a 'good thing'. Quite apart from coal's high carbon-intensity as a means of producing power, it is dirty in other ways - resulting in pollution that is harmful to human health as well as to the environment.