US President Joe Biden has told a major summit that we are in a “decisive decade” for tackling climate change.
The US has pledged to cut carbon emissions by 50-52% below 2005 levels by the year 2030.
This new target, which was unveiled at a virtual summit of 40 global leaders, essentially doubles their previous promise.
But the leaders of India and China, two of the world’s biggest emitters, made no new commitments.
Scientists tell us that this is the decisive decade – this is the decade we must make decisions that will avoid the worst consequences of the climate crisis, President Biden says at the summit’s opening address.
They must try to keep the Earth’s temperature to an increase of 1.5C. The world beyond 1.5 degrees means more frequent and intense fires, floods, droughts, heatwaves and hurricanes – tearing through communities, ripping away lives and livelihoods.”
