Bleeding Edge

In Paris now…

All Eyes Now Turn to Paris & the Climate Negotiators
By Rebecca Leber, Emma Foehringer Merchant, and Sasha Belenky

The Paris talks are falling behind schedule already, and it’s only day three.

Negotiators have a lot to do in very little time: They need to cut down a text of over 50 pages and resolve every minor and major word choice by December 11.

And they face their first major deadline on Saturday, when the French government, as the host of the talks, expects to receive a streamlined text.

Will they make it in time?

According to Carbon Pulse, negotiators are already meeting until 2 a.m., and, at the current pace, they will need to resolve a bracket every 90 seconds for the entire week to stay on track.

From there, higher-level negotiators will take this text to resolve the still-bigger issues.

Here’s the Environmental Parliament progress report on Paris Conference of the Parties — COP21 of 2015.

Twenty one years in the making this the state of our Environmental lack of Progress today.

Progress Report:

Commit to cut carbon emissions significantly by 2030.
China announced another step it will take in order to meet its goal of bringing down its greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, cutting pollution 60 percent from the power sector by 2020. Though the state-owned media provided little details of how to achieve this, the goal fits into China’s longer-term target.
Establish reporting and transparency requirements.
Transparency, according to U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern, “is an enormously important part of this agreement. I would say it’s a core part of this agreement.” This means defining when and how to report on progress, take inventory of actions, and review areas that need to be bolstered.
Create a payment system to finance climate adaptation.
There’s a huge gap between the $12 billion nations have promised in climate funds and the $100 billion annually that’s needed. It’s becoming clear that developed nations won’t meet that goal. Instead, there will be a heavy reliance on markets and private funding sources.
Put past disagreements aside.
Another obstacle to settling remaining questions around climate finance has emerged: India is insisting on gaining access to intellectual property rights to meet its clean energy goals, which U.S. businesses oppose.
Agree to return to the negotiating table regularly.
The U.S.’s pledge for Paris only goes out as far as 2025, and people are already starting to wonder when it will announce the 2030 pledge. Stern said the national target for greenhouse gasses could come in the early 2020s (something that also depends on the next administration).
Rethink the 2-degree target.
“This is half-assed and it’s half-baked,” climate scientist and activist James Hansen said from the sidelines of the Paris talks on Wednesday, arguing that countries’ commitments don’t do enough to address greenhouse gasses and sidestep more effective solutions, like a price on carbon.
There’s a lot of work to be done to bridge traditional divides and indifference over addressing climate change, but—for once—there are some signs of overcoming them. On Sunday, more than 700,000 people worldwide took part in climate marches, after the movement faced a setback when the main Paris march was canceled due to security concerns. President Barack Obama was among the 150 world leaders who showed up on the first day of the talks, and he framed a successful climate agreement as an “act of defiance” against the terrorists who struck Paris in November.

Here’s a roundup of the biggest news from around the conference and from around the World about the Paris COP21 conference today:

Lots more to come through this blog i the next few days…

Yours,

Dr Kroko

PS:

Remaining optimistic…

Still ?