Nature’s helping hand.

Today I listened to Business News Radio to a program discussing the progress in the Paris Climate Conference. All interviewees agreed that the forecasts of getting a solid agreement on temperature-rise reduction and CO2 emissions were positive. Finally, they said, some sense of urgency was felt by the world leaders.

Maybe this sense of urgency was increased by the perfect timing of Nature to launch some provocative events that made people aware of the direct effect of climate change in their region. For example, last November-month several temperature- ‘records’ were broking in the Netherlands, last week there was a flooding in Great Britain due to excessive rainfall and today the world biggest polluter China copes with a smog code red alert in their capital Beijing. The timing of these events couldn’t be better.

There was also good news: For the first time in a period of economic growth, the emissions of CO2 stabilized in 2014 and slightly fall – by around 0.6% – in 2015, according to a study published in the Nature Climate Change journal. (COP21, 2015)

Over the same period, the global economy grew by 3.4% in 2014, and this year is on a path to grow by 3.1%, note the authors, who underline that “Unlike past periods with little or no emissions growth, global gross domestic product (GDP) grew substantially in both years.”

Emissions have already fallen in the past, but that was during periods of economic crisis, particularly in 2009 after the global economic crisis.

So maybe Paris in the new tipping point in history; I hope so. Otherwise we could always count on Nature persuasive ‘helping hand’.

COP21. (2015). Opgehaald van http://www.cop21.gouv.fr/en/first-fall-in-co₂-emissions-during-a-period-of-global-economic-growth/