The United States administration has disbanded a 15-member federal advisory panel on climate change, The Washington Post reported on Sunday. The Advisory Committee for the Sustained National Climate Assessment included academics and experts from the industry. It was established in 2015, and its mandate expired on August 20.
The panel helped public and private sector officials understand the government’s research on climate and helped them translate it into policy. Its chairperson Richard Moss said that disbanding the panel did not seem like the best course of action. He told The Washington Post that it was shortsighted and was going to “...possibly hurt the next generation’s economic prospects”.
This comes months after President Donald Trump announced that the United States had pulled out of the non-binding Paris climate agreement. He had vowed to withdraw from the Paris accord during his presidential campaign. World leaders, including the heads of Italy, Germany, Britain, Canada, Australia and France, had condemned the decision was announced on June 1.
On August 5, the US administration officially notified the United Nations about its decision to withdraw from the Paris climate deal. The earliest date for the US to complete the process of withdrawing from the agreement is November 4, 2020, when the next US presidential election will be held.
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