UN climate talks begin amid dire warnings from world’s experts
The latest round of United Nations climate talks get under way today with governments facing pressure to ramp up action to cut emissions.
The meeting of 196 countries and the European Union comes in the wake of increasingly dire warnings about the state of the climate and at the end of a year which has seen severe weather extremes and increasing calls for action.
UN climate chief Patricia Espinosa said: “This year we have seen accelerating climate change impacts, including increased droughts, storms and heatwaves, with dire consequences for poverty eradication, human health, migration and inequality.
“The world’s small window of opportunity to address climate change is closing rapidly.” She said the conference must be the “launchpad” for more climate ambition.
The conference was due to be held in Santiago, Chile, but was moved at short notice to Madrid, Spain, because of ongoing civil protests in the Chilean capital.
In the week leading up to the start of the talks, the World Meteorological Organisation revealed levels of climatewarming greenhouse gases including carbon dioxide had hit record levels in 2018.
And the UN Environment Programme exposed a dramatic “emissions gap” between the action countries had pledged to curb emissions that drive global warming and what is needed to avoid the worst of climate change.
UNEP said emissions would have to fall by 7.6 per cent per year up to 2030 to keep the world on track to limit temperature rises to no more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, beyond which there will be severe impacts of rising seas, extreme weather and threats to water and food security.
Further reports released during the talks will reveal how hot the world has been in 2019, and the amount of carbon pollution countries have pumped into the atmosphere this year.
Despite the growing public concern over climate change, which saw millions of people take to the streets in September to demand urgent action on the crisis as part of the school strike movement, few new climate plans are expected.
But there will be pressure at the talks – which will be attended by United Nations Secretary-general Antonio Guterres – on governments to signal that they will be unveiling more ambitious targets and plans in 2020.
Next year sees the next major round of UN climate talks, which are set to be held in Glasgow towards the end of the year.