Monday, September 22, 2014

Obama To Address United Nations Climate Change Summit

President Obama addresses 125 heads of state at a United Nations climate change summit on Tuesday, Sept 23, where he wants to lay the groundwork for a global accord on greenhouse gas emissions.  Obama will call on global leaders to "step up to the plate and raise their level of ambition" when considering actions to tackle climate change and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.  This should be interesting considering that America is doing basically nothing to address global warming.
McCarthy, Obama, Podesta
President Obama will be accompanied by White House adviser John Podesta, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy, and the State Department's climate envoy Todd Stern.   Everything points to Paris 2015 for the White House, where countries will work to sign a global climate change treaty that would set targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. 
A number of world leaders will be absent from the event, however, notably Chinese President Xi Jinping, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

The administration says it isn't concerned that the leaders of the No. 1 and No. 3 emitters of greenhouse gases in the world — China and India, respectively — will be absent from the summit because both countries will represented by high-ranking officials.
The Obama administration rolled out more executive actions related to climate change.  The proposed standards would mandate that the nation's fleet of existing power plants cut carbon dioxide emissions 30 percent by 2030 from 2005 levels. While Obama will be playing up those rules at the summit.  Such rules can be easily reversed by the next president.
Last week, the administration unveiled voluntary commitments from refrigerant companies and food retailers to phase out the use of a popular coolant, and hydrofluorocarbons, which are 10,000 times more potent than carbon.

Obama also took executive actions to boost renewable energy and efficiency projects in rural areas, and launched a job program that will train 50,000 people, including veterans, as solar panel installers.  (The Hill, 9/22/2014)

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