BRISBANE, Australia: A Sino-US breakthrough on curbing carbon emissions proves a global deal on climate change is achievable, US President Barack Obama said yesterday, as campaigners hailed new momentum in long-stalled talks.
Announcing a US$3 billion contribution to a UN-backed climate change mitigation fund, Obama said the China-US deal unveiled earlier this week showed the way forward.
“If China and the US can agree on this, then the world can agree on this — we can get this done,” he said in a speech on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Brisbane.
Climate experts conceded that Republican opposition meant Obama could struggle to fulfil his $3 billion commitment, but said he was fuelling momentum for change in an area where talks have faltered since the historic Kyoto Protocol of 1997.
“You can sense the energy lifting in this critical conversation across the planet — the game has changed,” Greenpeace Australia chief executive David Ritter told AFP.
“A global deal has become more likely, no question. Climate is now front and centre for the US, it’s front and centre for China, that means it’s front and centre for all of us.”
Obama outlined his pledge to the Green Climate Fund (GCF) in a speech at the University of Queensland, telling the audience he wanted to ensure his grandchildren could visit Australia’s famed Great Barrier Reef “50 years from now”.
He said the fund would help developing nations cope with climate-related issues such as rising seas while also backing environmentally friendly infrastructure projects.
“(It will) let them leapfrog some of the dirty industries that powered our development and go straight to a clean-energy economy,” he said.
Obama’s announcement stymied efforts by G20 host Tony Abbott — who questions the science of man-made climate change — to reduce the issue to the margins of the Brisbane summit.
Despite Prime Minister Abbott’s reluctance, climate change appears set to be mentioned in the G20 leaders’ final communique on Sunday, a concession to US and European pressure that was described as a ‘victory’ by a French diplomatic source.
World Vision chief Tim Costello said Abbott was “like King Canute, trying to send back the tide of climate change when other leaders are saying this has to be discussed”. — AFP