"Try herding 200 cats," one official once told me. In truth, it's never likely that a single meeting could ever achieve that.ĬOPs were set up specifically for governments to tackle climate change, and the annual round of conferences does remain the only forum to tackle the problem collectively.īut they operate by consensus between nearly 200 countries that all have very different perspectives. So will Glasgow be the venue where the world shifts towards a zero-carbon future? That means any greenhouse gases they're still releasing by then should be balanced by an equivalent amount absorbed from the atmosphere, through tree-planting for example. Oil chiefs grilled on climate disinformationĪnd we are seeing something unimaginable even a few years ago: an unprecedented flurry of countries and businesses, some more plausibly than others, pledging to go net zero by mid-century.
Greta Thunberg: 'We need public pressure, not just summits'įour numbers that set the stage for COP26 They're also clearer than ever that avoiding the most damaging temperatures means halving global carbon emissions by 2030 - a deadline looming close enough to focus minds.Īrnold Schwarzenegger angered by world leaders' climate policies This year floods killed 200 people in Germany, heatwaves struck chilly Canada and even the Siberian Arctic was burning.Īnd scientists now have the evidence to say it's unequivocal that human activity is behind climate change and that's making violent extremes more likely. That's partly because the risks are hitting home. Even if everyone sticks to their current promises to reduce emissions, we'll still be on course for a dangerous increase of 2.7C by the end of the century.įor this conference, however, expectations for real progress are higher than usual.
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