UN summit catalyses progress on global climate agenda

WHILE the eyes of many environmentalists across the world are already on November's UK-hosted Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26), the US-hosted climate summit last Thursday and Friday was key too in the most important year for global warming diplomacy since 2015.

The US event, which saw President Joe Biden and some 40 world leaders convene on global warming, is important for at least two big reasons. Firstly, the US is back at the forefront of the climate agenda and announced plans to cut by 2030 greenhouse emissions by at least 50 per cent below 2005 levels, roughly doubling the previous US promise.

Mr Biden was unambiguous that the 2020s are "the decisive decade - this is the decade we must make decisions that will avoid the worst consequences of the climate crisis" and "try to keep the Earth's temperature to an increase of 1.5 degrees Celsius" to avoid "more frequent and intense fires, floods, droughts, heatwaves and hurricanes tearing through communities, ripping away lives and livelihoods". This clarity about the moral and economic imperative to act immediately is refreshing, and is a potentially transformative change from the Trump team's stance.