The Arctic needs immediate climate deal, top climate experts say
Below you will find statements of top climate experts gathered at the opening of WWF’s Arctic Tent in Copenhagen who gave their expert assessment of the outlook for the coming climate negotiations.
Kim Carstensen, head of WWF Global Climate Initative:
“These two weeks in Copenhagen provide the best chance the world has ever had to set its sights on a sustainable future.”
“We have everything we need: the science, the economic rationale, the popular support, the global engagement. All we lack is for world leaders to get together and agree that saving this planet is actually worth it. If they tell their negotiators to work on that basis, and then arrive here themselves to strike the final deal, then we can leave Copenhagen in two weeks with the beginning of the end of dangerous climate change.”
Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme
“The science, and the direct experiences of Arctic peoples, indicates that those long debated 'tipping points' may be coming faster than had previously been presumed only one year ago.
Copenhagen needs to be a 'political tipping point' of equal magnitude - one that matches the challenges and squares up to the realities now being felt by millions across the globe, not least in the day to day lives of the Arctic people.”
Jacqueline McGlade, Executive Director of the European Environment Agency.
“The Arctic has already seen the highest and fastest temperature changes across the planet. So while World leaders struggle to reach a deal that will keep the global temperature from rising to no more than 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels, the Arctic has already seen an increase of 5 degrees in surface temperatures over land during the past century - more than double the global average. The narrow balance between ice and water in the Arctic is at a critical state. Now even One Degree Matters!”
Outside of the Artic tent, sculptor Mark Coreth put the finishing touches to a life size ice sculpture of a polar bear. As the bear melts away over the course of the negotiations, its bronze skeleton will be revealed. A strong climate deal in Copenhagen will help avert the same fate for the real life bears, now struggling to survive in warmer winters.
For further information:
Clive Tesar
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