They waited all morning for President Obama, who arrived late following a presser at the WH regarding last night's strikes on ISIS in Syria. And even as UN Secretary General Ban ki-Moon announced the President's arrival, Obama was delayed for yet another moment.
God only knows what he was dealing with then.
"Our citizens keep marching and we cannot pretend that we don't hear them."
A few snippets from beginning of his talk:
We have the means to begin repairing it right now. As I recently heard from a governor, "We are the first to feel the impacts of climate change and the last who can do something about it"
We HAVE begun to do something about it. W are now using three times more energy from wind and sun than we did when I came into office.
We are Helping Communities to build climate resilient infrastructure.
We have reduced our total carbon pollution by more than any other nation on earth but we have to do more.
We need to double down on our efforts, working with states and utilities to reduce amount of carbon which can be dumped into air.
Working to make Green Climate Fund a reality, but let me be honest. In each of our countries there are interests that will be resistant.
We have to lead, that is what the UN and this General Assembly is all about. The nations who contribute the least often stand to loose the most.
Obama said that the use of US technology and expertise will be employed to develop early warning systems in regions most vulnerable to extreme weather events, rising tides and droughts.
Yes, this is hard but there should be no question that the USofA is stepping up to the plate. We will do our part and we will help developing nations do theirs.
Nobody gets a pass.
Emerging economies have also emitted large levels of climate emissions and are likely to emit more in years to come. Nobody can stand on the sidelines. We have to raise our collective ambition.
It must be ambitious, inclusive and flexible.
Follow the Summit
Obama text on resilience to Climate Change
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UN Climate Summit/March Blogathon - September 19-23
Diary Schedule for Tuesday, September 23rd
All Times Pacific
The complete guest list of diarists is in this announcement diary by rb137: People's Climate March Blogathon – Blog Team Thanks Meteor Blades. All previous blogathon diaries can be found here.
From ClimateBrad: I'm excited to announce that I will providing livestreamed, on-the-ground coverage of the People's Climate March this Sunday and at follow-up actions in the days ahead at PeoplesClimate.tv.
1:00 pm: rb137.
3:00 pm: VL Baker.
4:00 pm: newpioneer.
Please republish these diaries to your Daily Kos Groups. You can also follow all postings by clicking this link for the Climate Change SOS Blogathon Group. Then, click 'Follow' and that will make all postings show up in 'My Stream' of your Daily Kos page.
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12:29 PM PT: NGO Joint Statment:
The UNSG's Climate Summit today contributed to the growing sense that the fossil fuel era is ending and delivered some momentum towards an international climate agreement to be signed in Paris next year, according to civil society groups organized in two major networks.
A small but growing number of countries joined UNSG Ban Ki-moon and actor Leonardo diCaprio to confirmed the need to speed up the switch from fossil fuels to 100% renewable energy, such as Samoa, Tuvalu, Costa Rica and Denmark. Other countries, like Sweden, Trinidad and Tobago, Ethiopia and Iceland pledged to go carbon neutral by 2050.
While the Summit produced positive signals and some money on the table for climate action, many governments came to New York today to merely repeat what they are already doing. As the almost 700,000 people who joined the Peoples Climate marches over the weekend know, what they are already doing is not nearly enough.
"Leaders in New York, including US President Barack Obama, acknowledged they can no longer act against the will of the people. And on the weekend, the will of the people was made profoundly clear. Mums and dads, people of faith, progressive business leaders, union members and youth - all are already taking action in massive numbers, and they expect Heads of Government to join them and do more, now." Climate Action Network director Wael Hmaidan said.
"Government leaders have the choice to lead the orderly transformation of our societies or to end up on the wrong side of history."
China should be commended for signaling its intention to peak emissions as soon as possible. Such moves along with more ambitious actions by the US - which President Obama hinted at - could accelerate negotiations towards the global climate agreement due next year. We now need them to translate their positive rhetoric into concrete commitments – carbon cuts and climate finance for the world’s vulnerable nations.
Christian Aid’s Senior Climate Change Advisor Mohamed Adow said, "those countries that are hawking old goods today have to go back to their capitals with a renewed determination to get their countries on the right path with the words of the Marshall Islands', Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner ringing in their ears, who said in the opening ceremony on behalf of civil society "We deserve to not just survive. We deserve to thrive."
12:31 PM PT: https://papersmart.unmeetings.org/...
for latest statements from HOS and Ministers, etc.
12:32 PM PT: more news reaction
Al Jazeera with a piece on Pacific Islanders leading by example: http://america.aljazeera.com/...
Founder of World Economic Forum: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
Clean Technica on Rock/Google/Summit: http://cleantechnica.com/...
Another about Bangladesh PM: http://bdnews24.com/...
The Diplomat (Asia-Pacific) on what China had to offer at the summit (not much) http://thediplomat.com/...
Editorial from Khaleej Times: Libera vowed to stop cuttind down trees in return for development aid: http://www.khaleejtimes.com/....
Think Progress on Kathy: http://thinkprogress.org/...
MongaBay on Leo: http://news.mongabay.com/...
12:33 PM PT: full text of Obama remarks here
http://www.whitehouse.gov/...
12:45 PM PT: Follow these twitter groups for journalists and influencers
https://twitter.com/...
https://twitter.com/...
1:04 PM PT: WaPo with an interview-style piece on Sachs:http://www.washingtonpost.com/....
Global post on China/Netherlands cooperation: http://www.globalpost.com/....
Reuters on Obama calling for inclusive global compact: http://www.tidewaterreview.com/....
Sydney Morning Herald oped http://www.smh.com.au/....
China Vice-Premier calls for stronger China-EU ties: http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/...
Brazil says fight is compatible with growth: http://www.globalpost.com/....
Malta offering technical support to vulnerable states: http://www.timesofmalta.com/....
1:08 PM PT: DK Blogathon resumes Beyond the Summit: Gorillas, Guerillas, Grit, and Green Energy http://www.dailykos.com/...
1:47 PM PT: 1,220,400,000 current total of Green Climate Fund pledges.
2:04 PM PT: German govt representative at #Climate2014 summit says his country will not support any new coal power plants
2:28 PM PT: more coverage
New Republic dings Obama: http://www.newrepublic.com/...
InsideClimate News on the momentum: http://insideclimatenews.org/....
USA TOday on deforestation: http://www.usatoday.com/....
2:29 PM PT: http://www.un.org/...
Newest post by Ban Ki-moon
3:02 PM PT: US: John Holdren: Committed to making knowledge,data, tools, and models of US government widely available as global public goods. Sign on to joint action statement on global climate information. Executive order of Obama, integrate climate preparedness and resilience into agency decisions. Second initiative: release over course of next year and starting in next few days, releases 30 m resolution data to make it easier for local planners to take appropriate action against flooding and other threats. Third initiative: Develop reliable extreme weather outlooks (NOAA). Fourth initiative: expand NOAA's training desk program for climate signals... increasing very substantially the number of meteorologists from developing countries. Finally, new private consortium to enhance capacity of developing country, to boost resilience, and achieve development goals.
3:07 PM PT: From the cities: UN Special Envoy for Cities and Climate Change Michael R. Bloomberg and C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group (C40) Chair and Rio de Janeiro Mayor Eduardo Paes today announced new research that shows that if all cities took on aggressive new efforts to reduce building, transportation and waste energy use, they could potentially reduce annual greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by an additional 3.7 Gigatons (Gt) CO2e by 2030 over what national policies and actions are currently on track to achieve. By 2050, cities could cut annual GHG emissions by 8.0 Gt CO2e over what national policies are currently on track to achieve, the equivalent of cutting annual global coal use by more than half. Cumulatively, cities have the potential to reduce emissions by more than 140 Gt CO2e by 2050.
3:08 PM PT: 2000 cities will build a carbon repository, will be a reporting platform (publicly available, transparent) and make a standardised reporting in line with international efforts.
3:12 PM PT: http://www.un.org/...
UN Final Press Release