Low carbon sustainable community – going global?

Laurie Michaelis looks at the outcomes of the recent climate conference

by Laurie Michaelis 13th December 2013

Reading the decisions from last month’s UN climate conference in Warsaw, you can feel the delegates’ anguish. They know the scale of the task before them. They express ‘serious concern’ about unprecedented warming of the climate system. They warn of the urgent threat to society. They underline the gap between countries’ pledges to cut emissions, and the reductions needed to limit warming to 1.5-2°C. But these people, representing the governments of the world’s nation states, do not have the power to close that gap.