Dickinson to Durban » Entries tagged with "UNFCCC"
Baby Steps?
by Claire Tighe ’13 According to the UNFCCC website, the Cancún Agreement, resolved in Mexico at COP16 in 2010, accomplished quite a bit for the continued international efforts at mitigating and adapting to climate change. However, negotiations are by no means complete, and delegates at COP17 will have to continue these “baby” steps in the climate agreements. But are “baby steps” enough to solve climate change? As the online science resource Climate Action Tracker notes, “Emissions are at a historic high while actions are not.” The Cancún Agreements did manage to form “the largest collective effort the world has ever seen to reduce emisssions,” as well as “the most comprehensive package ever agree by Governments to help developing nations deal with climate change,” and a “timely schedule […] for keeping the global … Read entire article »
Filed under: Climate Change, Key COP17 Issues, Summer Reading Responses
High Expectations for Durban
The continuous challenge of global climate change involves a collective and comprehensive effort on an international level to reach significant decisions that could potentially address the dangerous effects of global warming. The UNFCCC annually performs an attempt to reach agreements over climate regulation. The Conference of the Parties (COP) comes together every year to promote negotiation, cooperation, and ultimately, progress against the effects of climate change. Most recently, COP-16 in Cancun, Mexico reached a number of agreements and attempts for regulation. Overall, the conference in Cancun was relatively successful in maintaining a mutual, collective effort toward reducing emissions, promoting sustainable development, and concurring with a common goal of keeping the average global temperature rise below 2° Celsius (http://cancun.unfccc.int/cancun-agreements/significance-of-the-key-agreements-reached-at-cancun/#c45). The many objectives for COP-16 included a wide range of goals: Establish clear objectives … Read entire article »
Filed under: Summer Reading Responses
Just a bunch of fluff.
The Copenhagen Accord reads like a Disney version of a classic fairytale. You know, the fairytales where they leave all the “bad stuff” out, the scary stuff that actually make the stories real classic fairytales, just so that everyone can enjoy them. The Copenhagen Accord is the treaty that Obama, as well as the “leaders of China, India, Brazil South Africa and about 20 other countries” were able to cooperate and agree upon that last Saturday night of the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen at 3am with all the pressure of the conference on them to come up with something (1). First they acknoweldge that climate change is occurring. Then they explain how all countries are going to have to adapt and respond in different manners because each country … Read entire article »
Filed under: Climate Change, Key COP17 Issues
Learning to Compromise
In roughly nine short weeks, the students of the Climate Change Africa Mosaic will be attending the 17th Conference of the Parties (COP-17) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). As this event draws nearer, it’s time we figure out exactly what goes on throughout this important meeting. Negotiations, political discussions, and potential solutions are all things what we should have a firm understanding of before we attend the conference. As an aide to this understanding, last week, we participated in the World Climate simulation exercise. Each person was a representative of a Developed Nation, Rapidly Developing Nation, or Developing Nation; for example, I represented South Africa, in the Rapidly Developing Nations category. Each category was provided with a chart, in which we imputed our expectations for CO2 emission … Read entire article »
Filed under: Summer Reading Responses
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