Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Introduction to the First Edition
- Introduction to the Second Edition
- 1 Global Warming and Climate Change
- 2 The Greenhouse Effect
- 3 The Greenhouse Gases
- 4 Climates of the Past
- 5 Modelling the Climate
- 6 Climate Change Under Business-as-usual
- 7 The Impacts of Climate Change
- 8 Why Should We Be Concerned?
- 9 Weighing the Uncertainty
- 10 Strategy for Action to Slow and Stabilize Climate Change
- 11 Energy and Transport for the Future
- 12 The Global Village
- Glossary
- Index
10 - Strategy for Action to Slow and Stabilize Climate Change
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Introduction to the First Edition
- Introduction to the Second Edition
- 1 Global Warming and Climate Change
- 2 The Greenhouse Effect
- 3 The Greenhouse Gases
- 4 Climates of the Past
- 5 Modelling the Climate
- 6 Climate Change Under Business-as-usual
- 7 The Impacts of Climate Change
- 8 Why Should We Be Concerned?
- 9 Weighing the Uncertainty
- 10 Strategy for Action to Slow and Stabilize Climate Change
- 11 Energy and Transport for the Future
- 12 The Global Village
- Glossary
- Index
Summary
Following the awareness of the problems of climate change aroused by the IPCC scientific assessments, the necessity of international action has been recognized. In this chapter I address the forms that action could take.
The Climate Convention
The United Nations Framework Convention on climate change signed by over 160 countries at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development held in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992 came into force on 21 March 1994. It has set the agenda for action to slow and stabilize climate change. The signatories to the Convention (some of the detailed wording is presented in the box below) recognized the reality of global warming, recognized also the uncertainties associated with current predictions of climate change, agreed that action to mitigate the effects of climate change needs to be taken and pointed out that developed countries should take the lead in this action.
The Convention mentions one particular aim concerned with the relatively short term and one far reaching objective. The particular aim is that developed countries (Annex I countries in Climate Convention parlance) should take action to return greenhouse gas emissions, in particular those of carbon dioxide, to their 1990 levels by the year 2000. The long-term objective of the Convention, expressed in Article 2, is that the concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere should be stabilized ‘at a level which would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system’, the stabilization to be achieved within a time-frame sufficient to allow ecosystems to adapt naturally to climate change, to ensure that food production is not threatened and to enable economic development to proceed in a sustainable manner.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Global WarmingThe Complete Briefing, pp. 174 - 188Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1997