Weather Eye with John Maunder

The following is a summary of the Climate Conference held in New York on September 23:

The purpose of the 2014 Climate Summit was to raise political momentum for a meaningful, universal climate agreement in Paris in 2015 and to galvanize transformative action in all countries to reduce emissions and build resilience to the adverse impacts of climate change.

An unprecedented number of world leaders attended the Summit, including 100 Heads of State and Government. They were joined by more than 800 leaders from business, finance and civil society. This summary details their most significant announcements.

A comprehensive global vision on climate change emerged from the statements of leaders at the Summit including the following:

Leaders acknowledged that climate action should be undertaken within the context of efforts to eradicate extreme poverty and promote sustainable development.

Leaders committed to limit global temperature rise to less than 2 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial levels.

Many leaders called for all countries to take national actions consistent with a less than 2 degree C pathway and a number of countries committed to doing so.

Leaders committed to finalise a meaningful, universal new agreement under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris in 2015, and to arrive at the first draft of such an agreement at a meeting in Lima, in December 2014.

Leaders concurred that the new agreement should be effective, durable and comprehensive and that it should balance support for mitigation and adaptation. Many underlined the importance of addressing loss and damage.

Many leaders, from all regions and all levels of economic development advocated for a peak in greenhouse gas emissions before 2020, dramatically reduced emissions thereafter, and climate neutrality in the second-half of the century.

Leaders from more than 40 countries, 30 cities and dozens of corporations launched a large-scale commitment to double the rate of global energy efficiency by 2030 through vehicle fuel efficiency, lighting, appliances, buildings and district energy.

Seventy-three national Governments, 11 regional governments and more than 1,000 businesses and investors signalled their support for pricing carbon. Together these leaders represent 52 per cent of global GDP, 54 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and almost half of the world's population.

Some leaders agreed to join a new Carbon Pricing Leadership Coalition to drive action aimed at strengthening carbon pricing policies and redirecting investment

Note. Of course not all of the world's media were focused on the Climate Summit.

Indeed, Christopher Booker, writing in the UK's Daily Telegraph, stated: 'Apart from the Middle East, there can have been few more depressing places to be in the world last Tuesday than the UN General Assembly in New York, where an endless queue of world leaders, including Barack Obama and David Cameron, treated an increasingly soporific audience to leaden little appeals for humanity to take urgent action to halt global warming.”

For a full summary of the summit, click here.