“Whether a slower growth in global emissions will be sustained depends on the use of coal in China and elsewhere, and where new energy will come from. In 2014, more than half of new energy needs in China were met from renewable sources such as hydro, nuclear, wind, and solar power.” — Corinne Le Quéré, Director of the Tyndall Centre
UPDATE!! New Dec 5 Text Sent to Ministers
This means technical negotiations officially closed.
French presidency now assumes the leadership of the 21st Conference of Parties which will get underway today.
First published on the Climate News Mosaic Paris Climate Talks Live Blog available here:
“I’m out of words, it’s just not right,” said Juan Hoffmeister, a Bolivian negotiator.
First published on the Paris Climate Talks Live Blog available here:
National Governments Should Be Helping Green Cities
Cities are responsible for 70 per cent of global CO2 emissions but they can save the planet by greening one community at a time said Vancouver’s David Cadman at the close of the ICLEI World Congress 2015, the triennial sustainability summit of local governments in Seoul, South Korea.
“We can do it. We must do it,” Cadman, the retiring president of Local Governments for Sustainability, told some 1,500 delegates from nearly 1,000 cities and local governments in 96 countries on April 11.
The majority of climate actions and most plans to reduce CO2 emissions are happening at the city level, Cadman told DeSmog Canada in Seoul.
Vancouver and 50 other cities have committed to 100 per cent renewable energy and 500 more are part of ICLEI’s Cities Climate Registry that documents verifiable CO2 emission reduction actions and commitments that amounted to 2.8 billion tons a year in 2014.
Cadman, a former City of Vancouver councillor, has been president of ICLEI since 2006. It’s an international organization headquartered in Bonn, Germany, with 280 staff and 23 other offices scattered around the globe. ICLEI, which stands for International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives, started 25 years ago in Toronto to help cities become more sustainable. It now goes by the more manageable name of “Local Governments for Sustainability,” but still uses the original acronym.
Canada’s federal and provincial governments were very strong supporters in the early days but the past decade has been very different.
Canada Chained to Fossil Fuel Sector
“We seem to be chained to the fossil energy industry in Canada and it’s pulling us down. Cities and organizations can hardly dare to speak out about this now,” he said.
Germany was only too happy to bring ICLEI to Bonn eight years ago and has been generous with its support, along with the European Union. Now the organization is experiencing what is being called an “Asian pivot,” with the mayor of Seoul, Park Won Soon, as the new president.
Park has helped Seoul to become one of the world’s leaders on sustainable development. With 11 million people and growing fast, Seoul will reduce its energy use and increase renewable generation including rolling out 40,000 solar panels to households by 2018 and 15,000 electric vehicles. By 2030, CO2 emissions will be cut 40 per cent.
“Action on climate will be by local governments no matter what national governments decide,” Park Won Soon told DeSmog Canada.
“We need to act quickly, we need to act energetically,” the mayor said.
China’s megacities are also joining ICLEI. At the congress, Hailong Li, deputy secretary general of the China Eco-city Council said the country will have 100 low-carbon eco-cities by 2017. That will drive down the costs of energy efficiency and renewable energy, Li said.
China also intends to become an expert on eco-construction and to market its expertise to the rest of the developing world.
By 2030 another 3.5 billion people will be living in cities so it is absolutely critical that the infrastructure be sustainable said Cadman who will continue to be active as special representative to the new ICLEI President.
Canadian cities could also do more and sooner if they had the support of provincial and federal governments, he said. That may be changing at the provincial level with growing support for various forms of carbon taxes that will help generate funds and financial incentives to reduce emissions.
“The provinces are doing the heavy-lifting on climate while the Harper government sits on the sidelines.”
Fossil fuels are in decline — divestment is taking off and investments are shifting to renewable energy. There’ll be no pipelines to the West Coast and no new investments in the oilsands, Cadman said.
Even in B.C., the hoped-for markets for LNG may not exist with China building gas pipelines to tap reserves in Iran and Russia, he said.
“Canada needs to move away from selling raw resources, but is any political party ready to go there?”
First published April 2015
Host a Live Blog from Paris Climate Talks By International Journalists
Would you be interested in hosting the Climate News Mosaic Live Blog of the COP 21 Paris climate talks during the last week of this historic event?
Experienced freelance journalists from a number of countries are already providing brief daily contributions as they happen. The Live Blog also has short reports from a variety of countries for a unique mix of global and local coverage.
The Climate News Mosaic (CNM) won the HostWriter Prize for its collaborative coverage of the UN Climate Change Conference in Warsaw (COP 19).
It’s free to host the Paris Live Blog. A small snippet of open source code from Germany’s Sourcefabric is all that’s needed to host the live blog.
Here are links to our Paris Live Blog on some of our media hosts sites:
Contact me to receive the Live Blog code and broaden your coverage just as curiosity and interest in what’s happening in Paris begins to grow rapidly.
I’m a CNM co-founder and a journalist based in Canada who won the 2012 Prince Albert of Monaco prize for climate change and environment reporting. I’m also author of the award-winning “Your Water Footprint: The Shocking Facts Behind Our Thirst for Earth’s Most Precious Resource” (Anderson Prize – Best Science Book of 2014).
COP21 delegates received the updated negotiating text of a potential Paris Climate Agreement (ADP Draft Agreement) wednesday. Still too long at 50 pages and 208 brackets (disputed text/issues).
“Current text is littered with “no text options” on the areas that are most relevant to empowering action by #G77 countries”
That tweet could have been made at every COP since Copenhagen in 2009 The new major economies (Brazil, India) and developing countries want to see more of the billions of dollars rich countries promised in Copenhagen to help countries adapt to climate impacts and reduce their own emissions. So far only about $30 billion has been transferred from north to south since 2010.
The Green Climate Fund is a new mechanism to receive and dole out this cash but it was practically empty in 2014. One of the breakthroughs in Lima last year was a commitment by rich countries to put the bare minimum, $10 billion, into the fund for 2015. It has been an annual struggle to get the money that’s supposed to become at least $100 billion annually by 2020. It is even harder to determine if this is new and additional money — not re-directed foreign assistance — as promised.
In Paris, finance will be a major issue. It is hard to see developing countries signing a new climate agreement without clear commitments and details about how the Fund will be replenished and reach $100 billion a year.
“We recognize that all people are members of the Human Family and that our life depends on our Mother Earth. We accept our obligation to our children and our children’s children to live in modest harmony with all living things.”
The main issue in Copenhagen in 2009 was determining each country’s fair share of CO2 emission reductions cuts and by when. If a flag could be attached to every CO2 molecule humanity has put into the atmosphere over the last 150 years, about 70 percent would be the flags of wealthy countries: the U.S., United Kingdom, Germany and so on.
Those rich nations agreed to make some CO2 cuts by 2020 but they were mostly small and voluntary. In exchange poor countries were promised $100 billion a year by 2020.
How much has changed at COP 21?
#1 Most countries have filed their plans for emissions reductions but they aren’t big enough to keep temperatures below 2C, never mind 1.5C. There is agreement more cuts are needed but the big issue is when. Europe and small countries want to see another round of cuts every 5 years starting as soon as 2020. Other countries like India want longer time frames.
#2 Money has always been issue. In Copenhagen rich countries promised $100 billion a year by 2020 to help poor countries cope with climate impacts and to green their economies. The money was supposed to ramp up from about $10 billion a year in 2010. Instead it’s been a fight to get any funds. Now developing countries want guaranteed amounts from 2015 to 2020.
#3 Legally binding agreement. For the first time the US is saying it will agree to this for parts of an eventual Paris Climate Agreement. The US will not sign a legal-binding emission reduction target, Todd Stern, the chief negotiator said today.
First posted on Climate News Mosaic Live Blog available at Inter Press Service news
One night in a bar a Russian journalist who I’d just met says: “This global warming is too complicated for people to know if it’s real or not”.
“You don’t think climate change is happening?” I asked with surprise since we were both covering a big United Nations climate conference.
“No one has been able to give me a good explanation to prove it’s real,” said Yuri (not his real name).
“I can explain it to you in less than one minute,” I replied.
Yuri was sceptical but I went ahead and said:
“The moon has no atmosphere so it is scorching hot (+100C) during the day and bitterly cold (-150C) at night. The Earth has an atmosphere made up of oxygen, nitrogen, carbon dioxide (CO2) and other gases. Over 150 years ago scientists proved that CO2 traps heat from the sun. We also know without any doubt that burning fossil fuels like oil, gas and coal emits CO2.
Measurements, not computer models or theories, measurements show that there is now 42% more CO2 in the atmosphere than 150 years ago before massive use of fossil fuels. That extra CO2 is like putting another blanket on at night even though you are already nice and warm. The Earth is now 1.0 C hotter on average according to the latest measurements. Heat is a form of energy and with so much more energy in our atmosphere our weather system is becoming supercharged resulting in stronger storms, worse heat waves, major changes in when and where rain falls and more.
That’s it.
After a long silence Yuri says “I guess that makes sense…”.
I’m not sure he was convinced but the truth is that climate change is not that complicated.
One additional thing to know is that CO2 is forever. Every little CO2 molecule we add to the atmosphere will continue to trap the sun’s heat for hundreds and thousands of years.
First published Aug 2015
Majority of Countries want 1.5 C target not 2.0C
Leaders of 30 nations began the Paris climate negotiations with a call to cut CO2 emissions dramatically to keep the global average temperature rise below 1.5C. These countries are part of Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF) — countries highly vulnerable to impacts of climate change.
The call for a global target of 1.5C is supported by 106 of the 195 countries in Paris this week. They also call for 100 percent renewable energy and a full decarbonization of the global economy by 2050.
Important to note that 2.0C is a political target not a scientific one. Moreover climate science does support 1.5C as a safer level of climatic change than 2.0. Currently global warming is 1.0C.
Leaders Inspired Speeches but BAU for Negotiators
Monday saw 150 leaders making speeches about the need for urgent action. However in the negotiating rooms today it was business as usual crawling along at a snail’s pace with negotiators apparently oblivious to their leaders impassioned speeches and pleas for urgent action said Saleemul Huq is the Director of the International Centre for Climate Change & Development (ICCCAD) in Bangladesh.
Billions and billions of dollars are being promised for renewables:
U.S. President Barack Obama, French President Francois Hollande and 18 other world leaders launched Mission Innovation, a $20-billion commitment to accelerate public and private clean energy innovation worldwide.
Bill Gates and other tech billionaires unveiled the Breakthrough Energy Coalition, to bring billions of dollars to help new, clean energy technologies come to market.
India’s prime minister announced an international solar alliance of over 120 countries.
Tuesday also featured a focus on forests
Deforestation accounts for at least 12 percent of CO2 emissions and among developing countries it’s often the largest source of emissions. Today the Lima-Paris Action Agenda “Forest Focus” launched a number of forest protection initiatives including a commitment Germany, Norway and the United Kingdom, to provide $5 billion from 2015 to 2020, if forest countries demonstrate measured, reported and verified emission reductions.
First posted on Climate News Mosaic Live Blog
Stephen Leahy, International Environmental Journalist 