Even though President Donald Trump included in his inauguration speech the promise to “drill, baby, drill,” and he immediately withdrew the U.S. from the Paris Agreement, we are not sure what his climate plan will be … exactly. There is a lot of speculation based on historical evidence of what the President said during his campaign and what he did the last time he held office; however, again, there may be some hope. The President feels, according to his remarks at the Capital One Arena on Inauguration Day, the Paris climate accord is one-sided and unfair to the U.S. Just to clarify, China is currently the largest global emitter of greenhouse gases and U.S. emissions have been decreasing since the mid-2000s; however, we are the largest historical contributor to total carbon dioxide emissions, according to an NPR article titled “Trump is withdrawing from the Paris Agreement (again), reversing U.S. climate policy.” Elon Musk seems to agree there is climate change caused by humans, but takes a more middle-of-the-road position when it comes to the oil and gas industry stating we should not “vilify” those industries. He also stated that the economy “would collapse” if we force oil and gas firms to shut down. All of this is true and even with the sales of electric bikes and cars, we can not wipe out overnight greenhouse gases due to fossil fuel emissions. The vehicle, as we know it – with a combustion engine – was introduced in the early-to-mid 1800s – first in Europe then in the U.S. – but it was not like people saw cars and everyone ran out to buy. There were several people who were afraid, some who objected to the noise and dust vehicles caused and others who just didn’t think we needed this form of transportation … we had horses and the steam engine. But the new “horseless carriages” took off and soon there were new jobs to build the vehicles and maintain them, roads had to be built and many more jobs were created just because of the “new” technology. In 1900 there were 8,000 passenger cars in the U.S.; in 1947 there were 30,849 passenger cars and 6,992 commercial vehicles; in 1977, there were 112,300 passenger vehicles and 29,800 commercial vehicles; as of 1987 there were 137,300 passenger vehicles and 41,700 commercial vehicles. And as of 2022 there were 283,400.99 motor vehicle registered in the U.S., according to statista.com. So even if you don’t believe that there is a climate crisis, thinking logically: with each vehicle there are fossil fuel emissions. When thousands of vehicles are added there are more fossil fuels released … and this is just considering vehicles not emissions from factories and other industries. When gasoline and diesel fuels are released they emit harmful byproducts like nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, benzene, formaldehyde and carbon dioxide. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a typical passenger vehicle emits about 4.6 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year, assuming the average gas vehicle has a fuel economy of about 22.2 miles per gallon and the average number of miles driven per year are 11,500. “Carbon dioxide (CO2), after it is emitted into the atmosphere, is firstly rapidly distributed between atmosphere, the upper ocean and vegetation. Subsequently, the carbon continues to be moved between the different reservoirs of the global carbon cycle, such as soils, the deeper ocean and rocks. Some of these exchanges occur very slowly. Depending on the amount of CO2 released, between 15% and 40% will remain in the atmosphere for up to 2,000 years, after which a new balance is established between the atmosphere, the land biosphere and the ocean. Geological processes will take anywhere from tens to hundreds of thousands of years – perhaps longer – to redistribute the carbon further among the geological reservoirs. Higher atmospheric CO2 concentrations, and associated climate impacts of present emissions, will, therefore, persist for a very long time into the future. CO2 is a largely non-reactive gas, which is rapidly mixed throughout the entire troposphere in less than a year. Unlike reactive chemical compounds in the atmosphere that are removed and broken down by sink processes, such as methane, carbon is instead redistributed among the different reservoirs of the global carbon cycle and ultimately recycled back to the atmosphere on a multitude of time scales,” according to the Royal Meteorological Society. We cannot just stop talking about it and the climate will be fine. This issue is not going away; 2024 saw a global surface temperature of 2.32 degrees F above the 20th century average. This ranks as the highest global temperature in the period from 1850 to 2024, beating the next warmest year, 2023, by 0.18 degrees, according to climate.gov. Although exact temperatures vary with climate specialists, NOAA, the World Meteorological Organization and NASA confirm 2024 was the warmest year on record. The bottom line is: Mother Earth does not give a flying fart in space (to quote Henry Dashwood, portrayed by Colin Firth, in “What a Girl Wants”) what political party we belong to; the Earth will just keep warming and we, our children, grandchildren and forever future generations, will continue to pay the price.