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The Upcoming UN Climate Talks in Glasgow Are a Make-or-Break Moment

October 5, 2021

This image provided by NASA shows Hurricane Florence from the International Space Station on September 12, 2018. | Photo by NASA via AP

The Upcoming UN Climate Talks in Glasgow Are a Make-or-Break Moment

Failure to halt greenhouse gas emissions is not an option—though it’s frighteningly likely

In early November, government leaders from around the world will meet in Glasgow, Scotland, for the latest round of United Nations–sponsored climate change negotiations. This year’s climate summit—COP26, in UN-speak—will be the most important since the 2015 talks in Paris, and this will be true however the meeting unfolds. If Glasgow is a “success,” this will be taken as a sign that our faltering international institutions might actually, if just barely, be able to spur the planetary mobilization we now desperately need. If it’s a “failure,” well, no such luck—it will become even more difficult to imagine cooperative planetary action, at scale and in time to avoid a truly catastrophic shift in the climate system.

How will we tell if Glasgow is a success? This is a tough question, one that involves judgments about both the geophysical realities of a destabilized Earth and the “realities” of our political systems, which are clearly not up to the challenge. The storms and the firestorms are looming large, and so too is the catastrophe of “vaccine apartheid,” which under Boris Johnson’s government has queued up a summit that does not promise to be either safe or inclusive. Even in the best case, the Glasgow COP is not going to yield anything like a world historic breakthrough. Given that a breakthrough is exactly what we need, how can we ever hope to judge the UN talks as even a measured success? By attending to key details. Keep in mind that, six years after Paris, plenty of people in the climate movement still can’t say “Paris” without saying “failure,” and this despite the obvious fact that, had the Paris Agreement not been completed before Donald Trump’s election, we would now be in even more terrifying straits.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

COP24: Climate Science Denial, Disinformation and Fake News at the UN Climate Talks

December 5, 2018

COP24: Climate Science Denial, Disinformation and Fake News at the UN Climate Talks

James Taylor of the Heartland Institute at COP24

And in Katowice, Poland, where the UN climate talks — known as COP24 — are underway, it was no different. A small group of climate science deniers tried to grab attention by hosting an event on the fringe of the conference, claiming to “present the science that debunks UN alarmism”.

But this year, very few were paying attention.

Year after year, climate science deniers have attempted to use the climate talks as a platform to undermine the global climate negotiation process.

The election of Donald Trump in the US and Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, two populist politicians who denounced climate change as a political plot to stifle economic growth and want to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, may have given these fringe groups some semblance of credibility.

Jesse Bragg, spokesman for the NGO Corporate Accountability, told DeSmog UK that although climate science deniers’ tactics haven’t changed over the years, “what has changed is the hubris with which these deniers trot their junk science out but just because Trump makes these deniers feel confident”.

“But that doesn’t mean they actually have cause or that support for them is growing,” he added.

Inside the UN conference, climate science denial voices have traditionally been ignored. Both Trump and Bolsonaro’s election were a blow to the UN’s climate negotiations process but those denying the scientific consensus of climate change have not — at least yet — managed to crush the momentum behind the Paris Agreement.

Isolated Deniers

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Polish Government Issues Terrorism Alert in Katowice Days Before Start of UN Climate Talks

November 28, 2018

Polish Government Issues Terrorism Alert in Katowice Days Before Start of UN Climate Talks

The Polish government has implemented a terrorism alert in the province where the annual UN climate talks are about to start.

Climate campaigners are warning of a “tense atmosphere” in and around the city of Katowice in southern Poland, where the global climate negotiations, known as COP24, are due to kick off on Monday.

Katowice, a city of around 300,000 people — and the smallest city to host the UN climate talks yet — is about to welcome nearly 30,000 people for the climate conference, including heads of state, government representatives and UN officials.

Over the weekend, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki has signed an order declaring an ALFA alert  — the first of four increasing terrorism security levels — across the entire southern province of Silesia, where Katowice is located, and the city of Krakow.

‘ALFA’ alert 

In a statement, the government confirmed the heightened security measures had been introduced in connection with COP24and will remain in force for the entire length of the talks, until December 15.

The heightened alert has seen increased controls implemented across the affected areas, with residents are asked to report any suspicious situation or individual.

It also means enhanced security forces will be deployed in cases of emergency and that officers can control and check vehicles as well as access private communications.

The Polish border police also confirmed that Poland’s borders with Germany, Lithuania, the Czech Republic and Slovakia had temporarily been restored and that the border could only be crossed in designated areas, with further checks being carried out at ports and airports.

The measures are due to last for the entirety of the climate conference with random checks being carried out for people entering Poland.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Climax Denied As Climate Denial Group Hits Repeat At UN Climate Talks in Lima | DeSmogBlog

December 23, 2014

Climax Denied As Climate Denial Group Hits Repeat At UN Climate Talks in Lima | DeSmogBlog.

You know that weird sensation when you experience something and you immediately get the feeling you’ve seen that very same thing before?

No, I’m not talking about déjà vu.

I’m talking about watching a press conference from climate science denialists at United Nations climate talks.

Specifically, we’re talking about the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) whose delegation took up the option of a press conference a couple of weeks ago within the confines of the latest round of international talks in Lima, Peru.

In a flyer promoting its press conference, CFACT declared “UN Allows Debate on Global Warming!” – a declaration that sounded like some kind of breakthrough moment when the UN had finally granted a press conference to climate science misinformers.

Except 12 months earlier, CFACT had also been granted press conference time at the talks in Warsaw, Poland (CFACT has long been accommodated by the UN and has also held press conferences at talks in Bonn, Durban and Doha to name a few).CFACT even survived expulsion when one of its delegates – British hereditary peer Lord Christopher Monckton – was debadged in Doha in 2012 after impersonating an official delegate during talks.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

ALERT! Tell #COP20 Climate Delegates: If Not Cutting Emissions, You Are Failing | EcoInternet

December 7, 2014

ALERT! Tell #COP20 Climate Delegates: If Not Cutting Emissions, You Are Failing | EcoInternet.

TAKE ACTION to urge immediate and fast emissions cuts at UN climate talks.

Abrupt climate change threatens the world with runaway global warming, extreme weather weirding, and global ecosystem collapse unless together we embrace a 1.5° C warming goal and begin to immediately cut emissions. From December 1-12 world leaders gather in Lima, Peru to negotiate the future of our planet. The Climate Change Conference, COP20/CMP, is a key event as we head towards the 2015 Climate Conference in Paris, where a universal agreement on climate change is expected to be adopted. Failure of earlier climate talks to begin cutting emissions means that even the dangerously inadequate target of limiting warming to 2° C is slipping away. Much science indicates that in fact limiting average global warming to 1.5° C is a more sufficient goal to avoid the worst ravages of abrupt climate change and the possibility of biosphere collapse. Neither target will be possible unless ambitious global and differentiated emission reductions begin immediately. Tell climate negotiators as the Lima climate conference opens that if they are not now cutting emissions fast they are failing.

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