Just 11 months after the Paris climate talks, the resulting treaty has come into force. The rapid ratification looks set to heap even more pressure on Australia to come up with a credible climate policy.
Britain, one of the European Union’s most consistent backers of climate action, is poised to walk out.
AAP Image/Newzulu/Paul Alfred-Henri
Britain was among Europe’s most progressive voices on climate policy. Its imminent withdrawal leaves the European Union grappling with voices of dissent from member states such as Poland.
Blue-sky promises? The Paris climate deal is unlikely to be legally binding.
Philippe Wojazer/Reuters
The Paris climate deal comes ‘pre-packaged’ by the promises nations have already made. But the issue of global climate finance could still scupper the talks.
Will the EU reveal its true face?
Francois Lenoir / Reuters
India has pledged to ramp up renewable energy and make its economy more carbon-efficient. And while that will help cut emissions, the main motivation is to give power to the many who still lack access to electricity.
Australia’s foreign minister Julie Bishop at the last year’s Lima climate talks, where nations agreed new transparency rules over climate targets.
DFAT
Countries that drag their feet on climate action have fewer places to hide these days. Rules brought in at the 2014 Lima talks require them not just to set targets, but to publicly justify them too.
Increasing emissions from Canada’s oil and gas sector will make Canada’s post-2020 pledge very difficult to achieve.
kris krüg/Flickr
Christian Holz, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of Ottawa
This month Canada revealed its post-2020 climate target as 30% below 2005 levels by 2030. But current policies make it unlikely Canada will achieve the target within the country.
Nations need to focus on the global carbon budget, not on what their neighbours are doing.
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Australia’s emissions target will inevitably be compared with other leading nations. But a fair target should be calculated not on a basis of comparison, but on the world’s shared 2-degree climate goal.
UN chief climate negotiator Christiana Figueres told a Melbourne conference Australia risks becoming an outsider at this year’s crucial Paris talks.
EPA/JEON HEON-KYUN/AAP
UN climate chief Christiana Figueres has hinted that Australia risks becoming an outsider at this year’s Paris climate talks if it doesn’t match the ambition of many other countries’ climate pledges.
Countries are working towards meetings in Paris in November that could see the first global climate deal since the Kyoto Protocol.
Taylor Miles/Flickr
Ahead of meetings at the end of this year in Paris, countries will submit draft contributions for a global climate deal. The goal: reducing greenhouse gases beyond 2020, and ultimately keeping global warming below 2C.