Joe Biden has closed out a two-day climate summit of more than 40 world leaders by warning that the planet risks reaching the “point of no return” if more isn’t done to escalate efforts to constrain the climate crisis. Biden, along with several other national leaders, made a number of new promises in the summit. Here’s what it all means. What has Joe Biden promised at the summit? As its centerpiece announcement, the Biden administration has said.
On top of this, the summit saw an American promise to double financial aid for developing countries struggling with the escalating droughts, floods, heatwaves and other impacts of the climate crisis, as well as a new US push to work with other countries on clean energy innovation.
The White House hopes the new commitments will spur other countries to do more, as well as signal the return of the US to the top table to climate leadership after a ruinous self-imposed exile under Donald Trump.
Is that enough to deal with the threat of climate change?
No. But then very little at this stage is sufficient. Despite decades of warnings from scientists, global greenhouse gas emissions have continued to soar, only dipping last year due to pandemic-related shutdowns. The cuts required to stave off truly disastrous global heating are now precipitously steep â reduce by around half this decade and then to zero by 2050.
As day two of the climate summit hosted by United States President Joe Biden got under way, a question raised by special envoy John Kerry about carbon-reduction pledges by the nations gathered was still looming large.
“Is it enough?” the veteran US negotiator had asked rhetorically at a White House press conference on the summit’s opening day on Thursday.
“No,” Kerry himself answered matter-of-factly. “But it’s the best we can do today and prove we can begin to move [forward].”
Kerry explained afterwards that 20 of the biggest countries at the summit represent 81 percent of global emissions, and that their commitments reflected “environmental justice, equity and fairness”.
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