IT’S GOTTA PEAK BY 2015

Peaceable Kingdom

CARBON EMISSIONS MUST PEAK BY 2015: UN Climate Scientist Agence France-Presse

PARIS – The UN’s top climate scientist on Thursday urged a key conference on global warming to set tough mid-term goals and warned carbon emissions had to peak by 2015 to meet a widely-shared vision.

Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the Nobel-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said the talks in Copenhagen in December must focus on 2020, a far more important target than mid-century.

“Strong, urgent and effective action” is needed, Pachauri told a meeting of ministers of the International Energy Agency (IEA) in Paris.

“It is not enough to set any aspirational goal for 2050, it is critically important that we bring about a commitment to reduce emissions effectively by 2020,” he said.

Pachauri added that over the last two years he had witnessed “a massive explosion of awareness and therefore willingness to take action” in climate change.

But, he said, the deal in Copenhagen had to be consistent with the findings of scientists, who say greenhouse gases that trap heat from the Sun are already affecting the climate system, and grave potential problems lie ahead.

The Group of Eight (G8) and other countries have endorsed the target of pegging warming to no more than two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial times.

Pachauri said this target “is not without some fairly serious impact.” Read more: http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/10/16-0

The Edge.

“This is the hour,

O my soul,

The day erased,

The lesson done.”

Tags: carbon emissions, climate change, climate system, climate warnings, CO2, copenhagen, g8, global warming, global warming goals, greehouse effect, greenhouse gasses, group of eight, international energy emergency, rajendra pachauri, un climate scientist, warnings