AP Photo/Andrew Harnik
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo gestures as he arrives for a meeting with President-elect Donald Trump at Trump Tower in New York, Wednesday, Jan. 18, 2017.
In early June, President Trump announced his intention to pull the US out of the landmark Paris climate agreement.But not all US states (or cities) are on board.
Eleven states, plus Washington, DC and Puerto Rico, have vowed to pursue policies that will uphold the US' commitments to the accord. They've joined the the United States Climate Alliance, a growing, bipartisan group that seeks to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions nationwide.
Washington governor Jay Inslee, New York's Andrew Cuomo, and California's Jerry Brown announced the formation of the group on June 1, following Trump's announcement about the Paris Agreement. A day later, another unnamed group, which contains 30 cities and over 80 university presidents, also pledged to work towards the emissions reduction goals that the US set as part of the accord.
The Paris Agreement, established in 2015, aims to keep global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius, a threshold that scientists say would have catastrophic and irreversible effects on the planet. The US, which is now expected to leave the accord in 2019, set a goal to reduce national emissions 26% below 2005 levels by 2025 as part of the agreement.
As of 2016 data, the US Climate Alliance's member states make up about 36% of the US population and 30.6% of the US GDP. The were responsible for nearly a fifth of the US' carbon dioxide emissions in 2014.
The map below shows the states that have signed onto the alliance along with potential members (states whose governors have expressed support but haven't officially joined), and the 2014 carbon emissions from each state.
Skye Gould