Guest blog: Time to Bridge the Gap Between Awareness and Action
Guest blog by Nigel Topping: High Level Champion for Climate Action at COP26. Originally published here. At COP26, our national and global self interests aligned in a way that drove cooperation and resulted in the Glasgow Climate Pact, COP26 President Alok Sharma said in a recent speech at Chatham House. That pact is a success. It recognizes the science and calls on countries to phase down unabated coal-fired power and phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies. It asks countries to revisit and strengthen their 2030 emission reduction targets by the end of this year. And it commits countries to scale up climate finance and double finance for adaptation by 2025. “Yet, at the moment they are just words on a page,” Sharma said. “And unless we honour the promises made, to turn the commitments in the Glasgow Climate Pact into action, they will wither on the vine.” And the world is still far off the path to stabilizing global warming at 1.5°C, UNFCCC Executive Secretary Pat...