Paris agreement negotiator Todd Stern attacks premiers who say that decarbonisation programmes are unrealistic and should be slowed down

Paris agreement negotiator Todd Stern attacks premiers who say that decarbonisation programmes are unrealistic and should be slowed down

Political leaders who present themselves as “grownups” while slowing the pace of climate action are pushing the world towards deeper catastrophe, a former US environment chief has warned.

“We are slowed down by those who think of themselves as grownups and believe decarbonisation at the speed the climate community calls for is unrealistic,” said Todd Stern, who served as a special envoy for climate change under Barack Obama, and helped negotiate the 2015 Paris agreement.

“They say that we need to slow down, that what is being proposed [in cuts to greenhouse gas emissions] is unrealistic,” he told the Observer. “You see it a lot in the business world too. It’s really hard [to push for more urgency] because those ‘grownups’ have a lot of influence.”

But Stern said the speed of take-up of renewable energy, its falling cost, and the wealth of low-carbon technology now available were evidence that the world could cut emissions to net zero by 2050. “Obviously it’s difficult – we’re talking about enormous change to the world economy – but we can do it,” he said.

  • Dojan@lemmy.world
    9·
    7 months ago

    It’s so cute that these grown-ups make decisions based on what comes out of their own arseholes. Perhaps it’s time to retire them.

    We don’t even know for certain how much carbon dioxide affects the climate over time, we just know that it does, and have educated guesses as to how much. Said educated guesses are under scrutiny because they might be too optimistic and things might be much, much worse than we’re currently attempting to adjust for.

    In short; what we’re currently doing isn’t enough, and what we’re currently pushing for might also not be enough. Sure, our goals might be unrealistic, and there will be catastrophes; that’s the price we have to pay because they chose to ignore and delay the problem. Instead of paying up and dealing with the cavity, we’re now arguing that it’s not so bad that the jaw is rotting off.