Two years of the Paris Agreement Moving from words to action in tackling climate change On December 12, 2015 at the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris, France, under the leadership of the then President Hollande, the historic Paris Agreement on climate change was adopted. It was a historic agreement for a number of important … Read More
Backtracking on the Paris Agreement The US withdrawal might not be such a bad thing after all During his campaign for the US presidency, Donald Trump had said that he believed that human induced climate change was a Chinese hoax, and promised that he would “tear up” the Paris Agreement if he became president. Since taking office, he has put in place confirmed climate change … Read More
Paris Agreement and tasks for us The Paris Agreement (PA) on climate change which was achieved at the 21st conference of Parties (COP21) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris in December 2015 was historic in several ways. Firstly, it, unlike its predecessor the Kyoto Protocol, which only required developed countries to take actions to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases, … Read More
What the rest of the world can do Although President Trump has only been in office for less than a month, it is already becoming clear how he intends to carry out implementing his campaign pledges and who he is appointing in his cabinet. It is therefore possible to assess some likely actions and policies on climate change based on his campaign statements and also some of his … Read More
Time to look inwards In 2015, the world made two major global agreements, first in September in New York on 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and then on climate change under the Paris Agreement in December . Both these global agreements have the same fifteen year timeline for their implementation, i.e. by 2030. However, in each developing country there are two very distinct and … Read More
Paris deal execution planning starts The Paris Agreement to tackle climate change which was achieved at the 21st Conference of Parties in Paris, France last December has been ratified by well over fifty-five countries accounting for over 55% of global emissions (the two thresholds that need to be achieved for the agreement to go into force as international law). It thus went into force on … Read More
The Paris Agreement and the challenges for climate change policy regime The historic Paris Agreement adopted in 2015 entered into force yesterday and is now legally binding. The agreement represents an immense triumph for global diplomacy, since it was ratified by 92 countries in less than a year’s time, including some of the world’s biggest emitters such as China, India, and the US. The Agreement has been hailed “historic” as it … Read More
1.5 to stay alive: UN’s warming goal feels the heat The tougher temperature goal was a great victory for the vulnerable countries in terms of global diplomacy and advocacy. Now comes the hard part of implementation. One of the most hotly contested and far reaching outcomes of the Paris Agreement agreed last December was the inclusion of the long term warming limit of 1.5C above pre-industrial levels. Going into that … Read More
The Paris Agreement on Climate Change – What can we expect? (This article originally published here) Earlier this month in Bonn, Germany, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) held its last round of talks to prepare the text for the Climate Change Summit to be held in December in Paris, France to finalise a new Paris Agreement at the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21). The draft of the … Read More
