Leading nations buy time on climate change

Leading nations around the world have convened in Paris to try and 'buy time' on climate change.

Seven nations have joined a Washington-led plan to cut soot and other air pollutants, which they believe could help 'buy time' in the fight against global warming. The UN Environment Programme found that sources of air pollution from wood-fired cooking stoves in Africa to cars in Europe could be causing six million deaths a year worldwide.

Britain, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy and Jordan have joined the US-led Climate and Clean Air Initiative, which brings the total members to 20 since the plan was launched in February. Jonathan Pershing, US deputy special envoy for climate change, told a telephone news briefing from Paris: "If we are able to do this we could really buy time in the context of the global problem to combat climate change."

He added that time is desperately needed if we are to slow global warming, and implementing these plans in the form of action will be the only way to achieve this. The US is the only member not to pass laws on cutting greenhouse gas emissions, despite proposed cuts by President Barack Obama.

The US plan, hosted in Paris, concentrated on limiting soot, heat-trapping methane, ground level ozone and HFC gases. In contrast, however, the United Nations has chosen to fight climate change by focussing mainly on carbon dioxide, which is the main greenhouse gas released by burning fossil fuels.

Karen Luken, of the C40 Partnership and the Clinton Climate Initiative, said that exploiting methane from trash decomposing in a landfill in Mexico City had reduced greenhouse gases and was providing energy for 35,000 homes, Reuters has reported.

"We will use that model in other places, such as Lagos."

The London Olympics has recently fallen short of their 'zero waste' legacy, as a new report finds that even though there has been some success in constructing the Olympic park, wider ambitions have been missed.

Posted by Joseph Hutton