Tag Archives: United Nations Climate Change Conference

The mood in Paris last December was unmistakable, the optimism palpable. After decades of gridlock and disappointment, the negotiation at the COP21 climate conference held to its promise of progress. As Andrew Deutz, Director of International Government Relations for the Nature Conservancy told me, what was different about COP21 from past negotiations was this time “there were no villains.” From the very first day, …

At the start of climate change talks this week in Bonn at UN headquarters for the Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), outgoing secretary general Christiana Figueres called the historic Paris Agreement the beginning of a “new era of collaboration” for climate negotiations. The 10-day conference in Bonn is the first UN climate meeting since COP 21 in Paris last December. After the formal signing ceremony of the …

Today is Earth Day. What more fitting moment could there be for the official signing ceremony of the Paris Agreement, adopted by 195 nations at the COP21 climate talks in Paris last December, representing 93 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. The opening plenary of the conference on November 30 marked a record for the most heads of state ever assembled in one room at …

Every nation on earth has agreed to abide by a historic 31-page climate deal. The signing of the climate agreement in Paris signals the start of globally coordinated efforts to reign-in climate change. History will record that the deal was signed at the 21st Session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP21) on December 12, …

Next week delegates. ministers, heads-of-state and civil socity meet in Paris at COP21 in hopes of striking an international commitment limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial levels. Data recently released from the MET Office in the UK projects average global surface temperatures in 2015 are set to reach the threshold of 1 degree Celsius, halfway to the limit of “acceptable” climate change. This temperature …

The final round of climate talks before the COP21 summit in Paris finished up in Bonn last week. As crunch time descends upon negotiators, the issue of finance remains a core unresolved issue. Developing countries have maintained that they have done the least to contribute to global warming but stand to suffer the greatest impacts and indeed already are. As a condition of moving beyond the …

In less than two months nations from around the world convene in Paris for the COP21 climate conference. With one more official round of negotiations before Paris, co-chairs for the United Nations ADP (Ad Hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action)  Ahmed Djoghlaf of Algeria and Daniel Reifsnyder of the U.S. have been hard at work whittling down the climate treaty draft text to a …