Tom Cheshire, Technology Correspondent

When the oceans rise and the world ends, do remember to thank the RSPB for their small part in armageddon.

I'll get round to the twitchers' role in our doom shortly, but that doom feels closer than ever.

Mr Trump's incoming administration will likely be the most anti-scientific and anti-technological in a while.

The President-elect is a climate change denier, one of his few consistent positions.


He appointed Myron Ebell, an even bigger climate change denier, to head his transition team for the Environmental Protection Agency.

Don't get too cosy, Myron - it'll be a short term gig.

Trump has pledged to abolish the EPA.

And leaks suggest that Trump is already trying to find a way to pull the US out of the landmark 2015 Paris climate agreement.

Meanwhile 2016 is already the hottest year on record - a new high for the third year in a row.

This is terrifying for anyone who doesn't relish the idea of drinking their own liquid body waste in a Waterworld future.

His real attitude stems, like so much of his policy, from a personal vendetta.

And yet, hope.

The Paris agreement can survive without the USA for four years. China dragged its feet for a long time, before it became choked with smog.

Now it is one of the leaders of the agreement, and it will continue to lead, President Xi Jinping has said.

The Paris accord was signed by 193 countries. There is a consensus.

And Trump's opposition to climate change is not ideological, but an economic grievance.

As he tweeted: "The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make US manufacturing non-competitive."

But his real attitude stems, like so much of his policy, from a personal vendetta. And this is where the RSPB comes in.

Trump denies climate change because he hates wind turbines. Can't stand them.

Trump didn't care about global warming until a renewable-energy company proposed building 33 wind turbines off the coast of Aberdeenshire. Right next to where Trump wanted to build a golf course.

For more than a decade, Trump has been fighting those turbines.

In his own words - America's President-elect

He was still lodging objections on the presidential campaign trail, after Scottish judges threw out an appeal against the development.

The golf course has been built. The wind farms still have not.

It was in 2006 that RSPB Scotland came to Trump's aid, also opposing the wind turbines, saying they were "extremely concerned" about their effect on avian life.

Trump seized on the orniphile argument, a step on his journey to climate change sceptic.

And for more than a decade, Trump has been tweeting - more than 100 times! - about how ugly wind turbines are, and how many birds they kill.

He even, apparently, invented a term for them: 'Wing bangers'.

During the election campaign, he told a rally: "The wind kills all your birds. All your birds, killed."

I suspect Trump doesn't care about birds. Especially after he was attacked by a bald eagle at his desk during a photoshoot.

I also suspect he doesn't care about the environment, except as an obstacle to business ends.

When Trump and Nigel Farage met in Trump Tower recently post-election, he encouraged Farage and his gang to oppose wind farms.

"He did not say he hated wind farms as a concept - he just did not like them spoiling the views," said one of those present.

Compared to other potential Republican presidents, like Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio, Trump is no true believer.

And in fact, he probably poses less of a threat to our environment than the Republican party itself, now in control of both houses of Congress.

Scrap the Aberdeen wind turbines, and he may even come around. It'd be a small sacrifice to save the world.

Sky Views is a new series of comment pieces by Sky News editors and correspondents, published every morning.

Previously on Sky Views: Katie Stallard: 'We are going to rape your women'