UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres warned that unless some concrete steps are done, the current global climate situation could lead to worldwide disasters and asked delegates to the coming 26th Conference of Parties of the UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, Scotland, to address the serious matter.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said Thursday that the current climate situation was "a one-way ticket for disaster" and stressed the need to "avoid a failure" at the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow, Scotland, which begins on October 31.
COP26 stands for the 26th meeting of Conference of Parties to the UN climate change conference.
The 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change, struck at the COP21 summit, called for capping global warming at well below 2C above the pre-industrial level, and ideally closer to 1.5C.
Guterres spoke at the high-level meeting commemorating the 20th anniversary of the adoption of the Durban Declaration and Program of Action.
But current UN estimates indicate a "catastrophic" warming of 2.7C is on the cards, reported AFP.
Guterres said the present indications "show a pathway of at least 2,7C heating above pre- industrial levels, and that’s obviously a one- way ticket for disaster."
Carbon pollution
"The carbon pollution of a handful of countries has brought humanity to its knees and they bear the greatest responsibility," he told an online press conference with members of the Covering Climate Now international project.
"I hope we are still on time to avoid a failure in Glasgow, but time is running short, and things are getting more difficult and that is why I’m very very worried. I’m afraid things might get wrong," he said.
"The G20 leaders will meet in Rome and they know their economies are responsible for four-fifth of planet carbon pollution," Guterres said.
"If they do not stand up ... we are headed for terrible human sufferings," he added.
China, US told to do more
He said: "China and the United States must do more than what they have announced so far."
Held between October 31 and November 12, the Glasgow gathering is seen as a crucial step in setting worldwide emission targets to slow global warming.
At current levels of greenhouse gas emissions, Earth could warm by 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) as early as 2030, the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change says in a landmark report.
"Global warming is likely to reach 1.5C between 2030 and 2052 if it continues to increase at the current rate," the report concluded with "high confidence."
Earth's surface has warmed one degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit)—enough to lift oceans and unleash a crescendo of deadly storms, floods and droughts—and is on track toward an unlivable 3C or 4C rise.
Wide-ranging threats
The US intelligence services meantime on Thursdaysaid for the first time that climate change poses wide-ranging threats to the United States' national security and stability around the world.
More extreme weather "will increasingly exacerbate a number of risks to US national security interests, from physical impacts that could cascade into security challenges, to how countries respond to the climate challenge," the White House said in a summary of the intelligence reports.
The prediction was made in the first official assessment by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, or ODNI, which oversees the sprawling US intelligence apparatus. — AFP
The US Treasury announced it will study how climate change is affecting communities and households in the United States.
The department's Financial Literacy and Education Commission said it would study "how households, communities, and the smallest businesses experience financial resilience in the face of climate change and climate transition," Treasury says in a statement.
It will also focus on "how to map climate-related financial risks and identify which groups and regions will be most impacted."The study will also tackle the best ways to deal with the threats, with an emphasis "on historically disadvantaged people and regions."
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