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CLIMATE-ENERGY-UN-COP24
Alarm sounded, nations urged to act at UN climate talks
KATOWICE, Poland, Dec 2, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – With the direst warnings yet of
impending environmental disaster still ringing in their ears, representatives
from nearly 200 nations gather Sunday in Poland to firm up their plan to
prevent catastrophic climate change.
The UN climate summit comes at a crucial juncture in mankind’s response to
planetary warming. The smaller, poorer nations that will bare its devastating
brunt are pushing for richer states to make good on the promises they made in
the 2015 Paris agreement.
In Paris three years ago, countries committed to limit global temperature
rises to well below two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit), and to the
safer cap of 1.5C if at all possible.
But with only a single degree Celsius of warming so far, the world has
already seen a crescendo of deadly wildfires, heatwaves and hurricanes made
more destructive by rising seas.
Johan Rockstrom, designated director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate
Impact Research, said the talks in the Silesian mining city of Katowice were
crucial in nailing down how the Paris promises will work in practice.
Delegates at the COP24 talks “cannot and will not discuss if governments
worldwide must achieve rapid greenhouse gas emission reductions to limit
climate risks — but how they can do this,” he said.
In Katowice, nations must agree to a rulebook palatable to all 183 states
who have ratified the Paris deal.
This is far from a given: the dust is still settling from US President
Donald Trump’s decision to ditch the Paris accord.
G20 leaders on Saturday agreed a final communique after their summit in
Buenos Aires, declaring that the Paris Agreement was “irreversible”.
But it said the US “reiterates its decision to withdraw” from the landmark
accord.
Even solid progress in Katowice on the Paris goals may not be enough to
prevent runaway global warming, as a series of major climate reports have
outlined.
– ‘Failure to act will be catastrophic’ –
Just this week, the UN’s environment programme said the voluntary national
contributions agreed in Paris would have to triple if the world was to cap
global warming below 2C.
For 1.5C, they must increase fivefold.
A group of over 90 independent climate scientists in October said fossil
fuel use must be slashed by half in the next 12 years if we have any hope of
hitting the 1.5C target.
While the data are clear, a global political consensus over how to tackle
climate change remains elusive.
Laurence Tubiana is CEO of the European Climate Foundation and, as
France’s top negotiator, one of the main architects of the 2015 treaty.
“Katowice may show us if there will be any domino effect” following the US
withdrawal, she told AFP.
Brazil’s strongman president-elect Jair Bolsonaro, for one, has promised
to follow the American lead during his campaign.
Even the most strident climate warnings — spiralling temperatures, global
sea-level rises, mass crop failures — are something that many developed
nations will only have to tackle in future.
But many other countries are already dealing with the droughts, higher
seas and catastrophic storms climate change is exacerbating right now.
“A failure to act now risks pushing us beyond a point of no return with
catastrophic consequences for life as we know it,” said Amjad Abdulla, chief
negotiator for the Alliance of Small Island States, of the UN talks.
And Gebru Jember Endalew, chair of the Least Developed Nations group of
negotiators at the COP24, said “international cooperation is the only way to
address the global threat of climate change.”
BSS/AFP/MSY/0838 hrs