Joe Biden says Donald Trump will not be able to undo Barack Obama's environmental progress

The President-elect has appointed several climate change deniers to serve on his Cabinet

(Alex Wong/Getty)

Joe Biden reassured people concerned about what effects a Donald Trump presidency will have on the Obama administration’s green policies that it is likely very little will be undone.

President-elect Trump has made it clear that he does not believe in the validity of climate change. He had even gone so far as to call it a hoax by China “in order to make US manufacturing non-competitive”.

Adding to fears among those concerned for the environment, he appointed a climate change denier – Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt – to head the Environmental Protection Agency.

But Mr Biden suggested that the policies in place have firmly taken root, and will be difficult for the incoming administration to dismantle, no matter how many fervent climate change deniers serve in the Cabinet.

“There is a constituency that crosses party lines. Regardless of whether the next administration is as aggressive as we have been – and I’m not suggesting they intend to – there is no way to turn back this tide that has begun to roll,” Mr Biden said at a Canadian environmental summit on Friday.

The Obama administration has invested heavily in renewable energy, raised vehicle fuel standards, and adopted the Clean Power Plan for states to reduce their carbon emissions.

As a result, Biden said, people and companies have spent less on energy than before.

“Reality has a way of intruding. Whatever uncertainty exists around the near-term policy choices of the next president,” Mr Biden said, “I am absolutely confident the United States will continue making progress on this path to a low-carbon future.

“And that’s because many of the trends I’ve mentioned have taken hold and are no longer dependent on government initiatives. They are market-drive, they are common sense.”

Still, Mr Trump has said he will undo the Clean Power Plan during his first 100 days in office, while eliminating “unwarranted restrictions” on fracking, and pull the US out of the Paris Agreement – the historical global pact to address and curb climate change.

“One of the things the President and I are proudest of accomplishing over the last eight years,” Mr Biden said, “is debunking the myth that America can’t grow our economy and bring down emissions at the same time."