Even Putin Is Now Worried About Climate Change
Russia has dropped its doubts about joining the Paris accords.
Russian bears.
Photographer: Alexey Nikolsky/AFP/Getty Images
After years of procrastination, Russia, the world’s fourth-biggest greenhouse gas emitter, has officially joined the Paris climate agreement, which it signed in 2016. It shows that President Vladimir Putin’s views of climate change are evolving and he wants his government to do more.
Putin was never a fully-fledged climate change denier. Rather, he once didn’t take it seriously enough. Addressing a climate conference in 2003, Putin started by joking that Russia could perhaps use slightly warmer weather so people spend less on fur coats and grain harvests would increase. He went on to say, though, that certain areas of Russia are hit increasingly often with extreme weather phenomena and that “possibly global climate change” could result in major damage.