Greta Thunberg berates leaders as UN climate summit falls short

UNITED NATIONS, United States — An emotional Greta Thunberg tore into world leaders at a UN climate summit Monday, accusing them of betraying her generation by failing to tackle greenhouse gas emissions, as announcements by major economies fell far short of expectations.

The Swedish teen's impassioned speech, in which she repeated the words "How dare you" four times, was the defining moment of the meeting, called by UN chief Antonio Guterres to reinvigorate the faltering Paris climate agreement.

Ahead of the conference, the United Nations issued a release saying 66 countries vowed to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, along with 10 regions, 102 cities, and scores of businesses.

But pre-summit predictions of new, headline-grabbing commitments, particularly by the likes of China and India, failed to match reality, angering environmental groups.

The world's top scientists believe long-term temperature rise must be limited to 1.5 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels to prevent runaway warming with catastrophic effects.

But rather than peaking, the level of emissions being released into the atmosphere are at an all-time high, triggering global weather hazards from heat waves to intense hurricanes and raging wildfires.

New data released Monday showed the 2019 Arctic sea ice minimum is ranked at second-lowest in the 41-year satellite record, effectively tied with 2007 and 2016.

"I shouldn't be up here. I should be back at school on the other side of the ocean," said Thunberg, 16, who has become the global face of a growing youth movement against climate inaction that mobilized millions in a worldwide strike on Friday.

"You come to us young people for hope. How dare you?" she thundered, her voice at times breaking with emotion.

Matters did not improve much as a succession of national leaders took to the podium saying they understood the gravity of the situation but then failing to announce concrete plans.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not say explicitly whether his country would enhance its commitments made under the Paris agreement -- though he did say it was working on more than doubling its renewable energy capacity.

There was also no new announcement by China, the world's biggest emitter. Senior foreign policy official Wang Yi spoke instead about the need for multilateralism, taking a veiled swipe at US President Donald Trump for pulling out of the Paris accord on taking office.

"The withdrawal of certain parties will not shake the collective will of the international community," he said.

Environmental and campaign groups reacted with almost unanimous disappointment.

"I think Greta's impassioned cry for sanity and for actually listening and acting based on the science was ignored," Greenpeace International chief Jennifer Morgan told AFP.

Trump surprise

Fewer than half of the 136 heads of government or state in New York this week to attend the UN General Assembly attended on Monday.

Trump, who announced his intent to withdraw the US from the Paris agreement and has heaped scorn on climate science, had been expected to skip the event but made a brief unscheduled appearance, spending a few minutes in the hall, where he applauded Modi's speech and then left.

Among those absent were President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil, under whose leadership the Amazon rainforest is continuing to burn at record rates, and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, whose government has pursued an aggressively pro-coal agenda.

Laurence Tubiana, one of the architects of the Paris agreement, told AFP the summit that Chinese lack of action was linked to its internal politics as it prepares its next five-year-plan.

But she said that she saw progress too.

"The big win is these group of countries who are for net zero by 2050," she said.

"The next step is to have them explain how they do that and what they do immediately." 

Increased urgency

Earlier, opening the summit, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said: "The climate emergency is a race we are losing, but it is a race we can win."

French President Emmanuel Macron invited his counterparts from Chile, Colombia and Bolivia to a meeting where $500 million in extra funds were pledged by major donors.

Macron also lauded Russia, which ratified the Paris agreement on Monday, and said Europe must do more, repeating a vow to close coal-fired plants by 2022.

Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel, repeated recently announced pledges including $55 billion for a new innovation and technology package and net zero emissions by 2050.

And British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced the UK would double its climate change funding through an overseas development program to $14.4 billion over five years.

In his closing comments, Guterres emphasized the positives, highlighting the growing action from the corporate sector, commitments from countries to plant more than 11 billion trees.

But he added: "We need more concrete plans, more ambition from more countries and more businesses, saying the next critical landmark would come at a conference in Santiago in December.

source: philstar.com

Bill Gates asks: 'Who will suffer most from climate change?'

LOS BAÑOS, Laguna -- “Who will suffer most from climate change?” Bill Gates posed this question in his latest blog post.

“The world’s poorest farmers show up for work each day for the most part empty-handed. That’s why of all the people who will suffer from climate change, they are likely to suffer the most,” Gates wrote, answering his own question.

Gates is optimistic, noting that many of the tools farmers need to adapt are quite basic, including better seeds, fertilizer, and training.

“The Gates Foundation and its partners have worked together to develop new varieties of seeds that grow even during times of drought or flooding,” he added.

The tools he mentioned included the “scuba” rice, a flood-tolerant rice variety that can survive underwater for up to two weeks. So far, 10 million farmers in South Asia have access to scuba rice, among other climate-smart rice varieties.

Scuba rice is being promoted by the Stress-Tolerant Rice for Africa and South Asia (STRASA) Project, an IRRI-led project supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

In April of this year, senior officers of the Gates Foundation came to IRRI headquarters in Laguna to see for themselves the work being done at the world’s premier research center on rice. They toured IRRI’s research facilities and heard updates on the science and partnership between the two organizations, including the latest on climate change-ready rice varieties.

Gates’s response aligns with the International Rice Research Institute’s mission to confront the challenges of growing rice in the midst of the changing climate.

, , IRRI director general, pointed out that many farmers who belong to the poorest of the poor have not benefited fully from the first Green Revolution of the 1960s-70s. This time around, the second Green Revolution seeks to leave no farmer behind.

source: interaksyon.com

Pentagon sees climate change as national security risk

WASHINGTON DC -- The Pentagon had regarded climate change as a security risk for the United States and were integrating possible impacts of global warming into the planning cycles, according to a US military report.

In the report submitted to the Congress on Tuesday at the request of the Senate Appropriations Committee, the Pentagon said that US national security interests around the world was subject to risks given the possibility that foreign states which were already fragile would be vulnerable to disruption caused by climate change.

"It is in this context that the department must consider the effects of climate change -- such as sea level rise, shifting climate zones, and more frequent and intense severe weather events -- and how these effects could impact national security," said the report.

The report said that US combatant commands were in the process of integrating climate-related impacts into their planning cycles to reduce the national security implications of climate change, covering areas such as the Arctic, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and South America.

source: interaksyon.com

UN talks approve climate pact principles

WARSAW - UN negotiators reached consensus Saturday on some of the cornerstones of an ambitious, global climate pact to be signed in 2015 in a bid to stave off dangerous warming.

Nearly 24 hours into extra time, a plenary meeting approved a modified text, thrashed out during an hour-long emergency huddle in the Warsaw National Stadium hosting the annual round of notoriously fractious talks.

Later, in a closing plenary session of the conference, delegates applauded as the text was given the green light.

Notably, negotiators had replaced the word "commitments" for nationally-determined greenhouse gas emissions cuts, with "contributions".

Developed and developing nations have clashed in the Polish capital ever since negotiations opened on November 11 to lay the groundwork for the new pact to be signed in Paris by December 2015.

It will be the first to bind all the world's nations to curbing Earth-warming greenhouse gas emissions from burning coal, oil and gas.

A key point of contention in Warsaw was the opposition of emerging economies like China and India to any "commitments" that were equally binding to rich and poor states and did not take into account their history of greenhouse gas emissions.

The issue is a fundamental one that has bedevilled the UN climate process since its inception 18 years ago.

Developing nations, their growth largely powered by fossil fuel combustion, blame the West's long emissions history for the peril facing the planet, and insist their wealthier counterparts carry a larger responsibility to fix the problem.

"Only developed countries should have commitments," Chinese negotiator Su Wei earlier told fellow negotiators. Emerging economies could merely be expected to "enhance action", he said.

The West, though, insists emerging economies must do their fair share, considering that China is now the world's biggest emitter of CO2, with India in fourth place after the United States and Europe.

Delegates had also reached a consensus agreement on financing to help poor countries deal with climate change effects.

But early Saturday evening, no agreement had yet been struck on creating a "loss and damage" mechanism for future climate harm that vulnerable countries say is no longer avoidable.

source: interaksyon.com

As rich, poor nations butt heads, troubled UN climate talks run into extra time

WARSAW -- UN climate talks were blocked in Warsaw Saturday more than 12 hours after they were to have delivered a roadmap towards a global pact to stave of dangerous global warming.

The belligerent negotiations were to have closed at 1700 GMT on Friday, but by breakfast time Saturday, diplomats were still shuttling to and fro in a last-ditch bid to find consensus.

"There will be no forcing of decisions against the will of parties," conference president Marcin Korolec of Poland told a brief stock-taking meeting at 0600 GMT -- and said it was "premature" to set a time for the closing plenary meeting.

"We will reconvene here in a formal setting at 9am (0800 GMT) to address the situation and find a way forward to conclude the conference," he said.

The Warsaw round of the notoriously fractious annual talks have seen rich and poor nations butting heads since November 11 about their respective contributions to the UN-backed goal of limiting average global warming to 2.0 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) over pre-industrial levels.

UN nations had agreed to sign a global deal by 2015 to meet this goal with binding targets for all countries to curb climate-altering greenhouse gas emissions.

The pact must be inked in Paris in two years' time, and will enter into effect in 2020.

Negotiators from over 190 countries argued in the Polish capital over apportioning targets for carbon emissions cuts between rich and poor states, and over funding for climate-vulnerable countries.

On current emissions trends, scientists warn the Earth could face warming of 4.0 C or higher over pre-industrial levels -- a recipe for catastrophic storms, droughts, floods and land-gobbling sea-level rise that would hit poor countries disproportionally hard.

A major sticking point was the insistence of some developing nations like China and India, their growth fuelled by fossil fuel combustion, to be guaranteed less onerous emissions curbs compared to wealthy nations.

In hotly disputed language, some wanted the new deal to impose "commitments" on developed countries, whose long history of emissions they blame for the current state of affairs, and seek only "efforts" from emerging economies.

The West, though, insists emerging economies must do their fair share, considering that China is now the world's biggest emitter of CO2, with India in fourth place after the United States and Europe.

A draft text that negotiators mulled over on Saturday underlined that the pact would be "applicable to all parties".

And it invited the world's nations to announce their emissions-curbing commitments "well in advance" of the Paris gathering.

Money was also a bone of contention.

Developing nations insist that wealthy nations must show how they intend to keep a promise to ramp up climate aid to $100 billion (74 billion euros) by 2020, up from $10 billion a year from 2010-12.

Still struggling with an economic crisis, however, the developed world is wary of unveiling a detailed long-term funding plan at this stage.

A separate draft text on finance "urges" parties to mobilise funds "at increasing levels".

"We came here for a finance COP (Conference of Parties). What we got was peanuts," Bangladeshi negotiator Qamrul Chowdhury told AFP of the text on Saturday.

The funding crunch lies at the heart of another issue which bedevilled the talks: demands by developing countries for a "loss and damage" mechanism to help them deal with future harm from climate impacts they say are too late to avoid.

Rich nations feared this would amount to signing a blank cheque for never-ending liability.

Observers said a compromise on this point may be announced soon.

On Thursday, environment and developmental observer groups stormed out of the conference, saying the talks had produced little more than hot air and were "on track to deliver virtually nothing".

source: interaksyon.com

Switch Off Appliances, Public Told

CEBU CITY, Philippines — For Earth Hour this year, Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) 7 Regional Executive Director Maximo O. Dichoso is urging the public to switch off not only their lights but also other non-essential electrical appliances for one hour and beyond.

Earth Hour 2012 will be observed today, March 31, from 8:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. (local time). People, businesses and communities from across the globe are encouraged to turn off their lights for one hour to send a message on taking action against global warming. For the past three years, the Philippines recorded the most number of participating towns and cities.

"This is an opportunity to express our solidarity to the rest of the world that we are serious in reducing our carbon footprint by decreasing our electrical consumption for an hour or more than 60 minutes, thus lessening emissions generated from carbon dioxide and fossil fuel, which hugely contribute to climate change," Dichoso said.

Carbon footprint refers to the totality of the impact or effect of all activities done by an organization, group or individual on the environment. It covers all greenhouse gases that each individual or organization may emit in the atmosphere as a result of its activities. (Phoebe Jen Indino)

source: mb.com.ph