On Friday, Donald Trump will be inaugurated as the 45th President of the United States. His scepticism of manmade climate change is well-known. His tweet from 2012 that global warming was a hoax designed by China to harm American manufacturing has been shared many times online. After Trump appeared to acknowledge “some connectivity” between human activity and climate change in a post-election interview, his Chief of Staff swiftly clarified that the administration’s default position is that climate science is “mostly bunk”.

Over in the UK, Trump’s victory is being cheered enthusiastically by a fringe movement of climate sceptics. They urge Theresa May to follow his lead and abandon attempts to decarbonise the economy. James Delingpole has written that his elections marks “the beginning of the end of the Green Blob”. Sunday Times columnist Dominic Lawson has suggested that if Trump pulls the US out of the Paris Agreement, “perhaps a British cabinet might dare to question Westminster’s religious faith in the Climate Change Act.”

But the Prime Minister has rightly ignored these voices. Just days after she entered Downing Street, her Government passed the fifth carbon budget into law, setting an ambitious target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 2032. She appointed Greg Clark and Nick Hurd to lead on climate change in the new Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, two of the most committed green conservatives in Parliament. And rightly so, because the case for reducing carbon emissions has never been stronger.

10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Show all 10 1 /10 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A group of emperor penguins face a crack in the sea ice, near McMurdo Station, Antarctica Kira Morris 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Floods destroyed eight bridges and ruined crops such as wheat, maize and peas in the Karimabad valley in northern Pakistan, a mountainous region with many glaciers. In many parts of the world, glaciers have been in retreat, creating dangerously large lakes that can cause devastating flooding when the banks break. Climate change can also increase rainfall in some areas, while bringing drought to others. Hira Ali 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Smoke – filled with the carbon that is driving climate change – drifts across a field in Colombia. Sandra Rondon 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Amid a flood in Islampur, Jamalpur, Bangladesh, a woman on a raft searches for somewhere dry to take shelter. Bangladesh is one of the most vulnerable places in the world to sea level rise, which is expected to make tens of millions of people homeless by 2050. Probal Rashid 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Sindh province in Pakistan has experienced a grim mix of two consequences of climate change. “Because of climate change either we have floods or not enough water to irrigate our crop and feed our animals,” says the photographer. “Picture clearly indicates that the extreme drought makes wide cracks in clay. Crops are very difficult to grow.” Rizwan Dharejo 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Hanna Petursdottir examines a cave inside the Svinafellsjokull glacier in Iceland, which she said had been growing rapidly. Since 2000, the size of glaciers on Iceland has reduced by 12 per cent. Tom Schifanella 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A river once flowed along the depression in the dry earth of this part of Bangladesh, but it has disappeared amid rising temperatures. Abrar Hossain 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A shepherd moves his herd as he looks for green pasture near the village of Sirohi in Rajasthan, northern India. The region has been badly affected by heatwaves and drought, making local people nervous about further predicted increases in temperature. Riddhima Singh Bhati 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A factory in China is shrouded by a haze of air pollution. The World Health Organisation has warned such pollution, much of which is from the fossil fuels that cause climate change, is a “public health emergency”. Leung Ka Wa 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Water levels in reservoirs, like this one in Gers, France, have been getting perilously low in areas across the world affected by drought, forcing authorities to introduce water restrictions. Mahtuf Ikhsan

First, the science. Average surface temperatures across the world in 2016 will make it the hottest year on record. Of course, on its own, this proves nothing: The naturally occurring “El Niño” weather event in the Pacific earlier this year caused temperatures to spike. But the trend of rising temperatures over several decades provides compelling evidence of the climate change phenomenon. In the UK, the eight warmest years on record have all occurred since 2002. With each year that passes scientists are becoming more knowledgeable about the risks. For instance, research this year has shown climate change has already reduced the number of bird species in the UK.

Second, the economics of clean energy. In over 30 countries, onshore wind and solar are already cheaper than fossil fuels. In just six months last year, competitive power auctions saw global offshore wind prices fall by 22 per cent. Here in the UK, the latest government estimate of the cost of different technologies finds that the next set of onshore wind and solar projects commissioned in the UK will be cheaper than gas. This changing dynamic is why clean energy exponents should beware of expensive projects like Swansea Bay tidal lagoon and Hinkley Point C nuclear power station, which undermine the economic case for clean energy.

The spectre of power blackouts from a lack of renewable output on cloudy, calm days is receding. Technology capable of storing electricity is advancing rapidly. Analysts forecast that the per-unit cost of storage could halve by 2020. And with electric vehicles soon to penetrate the mass market, millions of households could have their own battery able to store electricity when weather conditions are favourable and deploy during peak demand.

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Bright Blue research last year showed we no longer need old, unreliable, and polluting coal to keep the lights on. The remaining coal-fired power stations can be comfortably taken offline by 2025, leaving plenty of time to build the extra gas, renewable power, energy storage, and energy efficiency to fill the gap.

Third, the politics. Already a clear majority of people in the UK believe in climate change – including over 50 per cent of those that vote Conservative. Bright Blue will shortly be publishing a report analysing further the nuances of conservative views on the environment. But as warmer temperatures, more extreme weather events, and rising sea levels start to become more frequent, support for climate action is very likely to increase. Flooding, for instance, is already costing the UK economy on average over £1bn a year, and the Government believes this could rise to £6.8bn by 2050.

There is no prospect of sceptics controlling the climate policy of the main right-of-centre party in the UK as they do in the US, where ironically anti-Trump and pro-Trump Republicans find scant common ground in their opposition to this agenda. In the UK, they are few in number and lack any real hold over the Government’s programme. But their association with the conservative movement risks contaminating the centre-right brand. Conservatives should be loud about disowning the increasingly irrelevant ideas of these fringe elements. If we do not, as the climate science and economic opportunities of clean energy become clearer, there could be an electoral price to pay.