Critical climate negotiations begin with U.S. on sideline.
KATOWICE, Poland — Negotiators from around the world began two weeks of talks on curbing climate change Sunday, three years after sealing a landmark deal in Paris that set a goal of keeping global warming well below 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit.
Envoys from almost 200 nations gathered in Poland’s southern city of Katowice for two weeks of negotiations.
“We are here to enable the world to act together on climate change,” said Poland’s environmental envoy, Michal Kurtyka, who is presiding over the U.N. meeting, known as COP24.
With further meetings next year meant to build on what’s decided in Katowice, he urged all countries to “show creativity and flexibility.”
“The United Nations secretary-general is counting on us, all of us to deliver,” Kurtyka said. “There is no Plan B.”
Ministers and some heads of government plan to join the discussion Monday, when host Poland is expected to push for a declaration ensuring a “just transition” for fossil fuel industries that face cuts and closures amid efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The meeting received a boost over the weekend when 19 major economies at the G-20 summit affirmed their commitment to the 2015 Paris climate accord. The only holdout was the United States, which announced under President Trump that it is withdrawing from the climate pact.
“It is sad that the federal administration of the United States, a country that is increasingly feeling the full force of climate impacts, continues to refuse to listen to the objective voice of science when it comes to climate change,” said Christiana Figueres, a former head of the U.N. climate office.
She cited a recent expert report warning of the consequences of letting average global temperatures rise beyond 1.5 degrees C (2.7 degrees F).
“The rest of the G-20 have not only understood the science, they are taking actions to both prevent the major impacts and strengthen their economies,” said Figueres, who now works with Mission 2020, a group that campaigns to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Although the Trump administration still intends to withdraw from the Paris agreement as soon as it’s eligible to do so in 2020, it is sending a delegation to participate in COP24 “to ensure a level playing field that benefits and protects U.S. interests,” the State Department said in a statement.
The meeting in Katowice is regarded as a key test of countries’ willingness to back their lofty but distant goals with concrete measures, some of which are already drawing fierce protests. At the top of the agenda is what is known as the Paris rulebook, which will determine how governments record and report their greenhouse emissions and efforts to cut them.
Separately, negotiators will discuss ramping up countries’ national emissions targets after 2020, and financial support for poor nations that are struggling to adapt to climate change.