The US has withdrawn from a number of UN climate organisations, including the Framework Convention on Climate Change, International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
A presidential memorandum from the White House this week withdrew the US from dozens of international organisations, most linked to the UN, which it said are “contrary to the interests of the United States”. As well as the above organisations, it lists the International Solar Alliance and a slew of other bodies covering security, international aid and development.
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Withdrawal entails “ceasing participation in or funding to those entities to the extent permitted by law.”
The impact of this withdrawal may be more political than practical. It clearly signals the current administration’s isolationist outlook, something which began on President Trump’s inauguration day when he withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement for climate change targets.
The US solar and renewables markets will likely slow as a result of the Trump administration’s domestic and trade policies, which the industry has called “unequal” and the leading US trade body has warned could push up to 116GW of projects into political “limbo”.
But despite “policy headwinds” pushing up the price of solar offtake agreements in North America, the US renewables market has been driven by the economics of solar and energy storage, private corporations’ own energy targets and growing demand (particularly from data centre “hyperscalers”) and the previous administration’s tax breaks for renewables. State or international targets centred on climate commitments have not been a major driver of the growth in US renewables.
In the rest of the world, renewables – led by solar PV – have begun to outstrip traditional power sources in terms of investment and installed capacity. IRENA itself has said that US$54 billion was invested in solar PV in 2024 and that global renewable energy installations have increased more than twice as fast as total electricity generation since 2012. This is in part due to international commitments like those set out by the UN, and partly thanks to the low cost of solar power.
There are global challenges to net-zero climate targets, and the current trajectory will not reach 2030 or 2050 commitments. IRENA said that global renewables deployments will need to increase significantly to reach the 2023 COP28 agreed targets, and policy and economic challenges have caused a decline in Europe’s solar PV market.
Withdrawing the US from these UN initiatives will not help the global solar market or energy transition, but it may not hinder it unduly either.
