United States President-elect Donald Trump appears to be committed to reversing the US policy on climate change pursued by the Obama Administration.

This is clearly evident in his selection of Mr Scott Pruitt as the new head of the Environmental Protection Agency. Mr Pruitt is one of those people who deny climate change, ignoring overwhelming and incontrovertible scientific evidence, such as the graphic effects of sea level rise in Alaska and Florida. He is also an unrepentant supporter of the fossil fuel industry.

Another apparent nail in the coffin of the effort to combat climate change is the proposed appointment of ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson as secretary of state. Mr Steve Coll’s award-winning 2013 masterpiecePrivate Empire: ExxonMobil and American Power, leaves no doubt of Exxon’s powerful influence over US foreign policy, and documents in detail the multinational corporation’s considerable funding of people and institutions that deny the existence of climate change.

The result is a well-funded public relations campaign which consistently challenges the scientific consensus that global warming is real and is due primarily to human consumption of fossil fuels. The US Union of Concerned Scientists reports that ExxonMobil funded 29 climate change denial groups and institutions since 1990. Exxon has spent more than US$20 million on funding such entities that deny climate change and global warming by disseminating misinformation through publications and websites.

This combination of personalities could be the nemesis of environmental protection as we know it, and to the Paris Agreement within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) dealing with greenhouse gas emissions mitigation, adaptation and finance starting in the year 2020.

The Paris agreement, described by President Barack Obama as “a turning point in the history of the world”, was adopted by consensus on December 12, 2015 and to date, 194 UNFCCC members have signed the treaty, 117 of which have ratified it.

The US Government funding for climate change research, technology, international assistance, and adaptation amounted to US$11.6 billion in 2014, with an additional US$26.1 billion for climate change programmes and activities provided by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in 2009. In 2012, the US provided about US$1.4 billion for bilateral and multilateral efforts to mitigate climate change.

The anti-environment, anti-climate change view of president-elect Trump and the members of his proposed Cabinet portend a drastic rollback of measures to protect the environment and promote sustainable development. Undermining the COP 21, which the US ratified in September 2016, is also a possibility because what the US does could lead other countries to renege on their commitments.

The US could also drastically reduce its financial and technical support for mitigation of climate change and global warming. It’s not always a brave new world that beckons.