Secretary of State Hillary Clinton brought some much need good news to Copenhagen with her. In an announcement this morning, Clinton announced that the United States was ready to join other industrialized nations in mobilizing 100 billion dollars a year in climate aid for developing and vulnerable nations by 2020 at the Climate Change conference.
The issue of long-term financing for developing countries has been one of the major sticking points at the conference. Poor countries, which have done the least to cause climate change, are expected to be the hardest hit by a warming earth, including droughts, severe storms, desertification, floods, and rising sea levels. With Clinton’s announcement it appeared that at least one stumbling block was overcome.
Clinton, however, made it clear that the United States’ support for the 100 billion dollar a year fund is contingent on “all major economies”, most especially China, standing “behind meaningful mitigation actions and [providing] full transparency as to their implementation.”
From the beginning of the conference the United States has been firm that China, and other major rising economies such as India, open their emissions up to international auditing. Already, the president of Indonesia, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, has signaled his support of international monitoring.
Still China has resisted, but if China compromises on this, an agreement may be possible in the waning hours.
Related articles
Is the US sinking climate change talks at Copenhagen?
(12/16/2009) While it’s difficult to know what’s truly going on inside the Bella Center at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, a pattern seems to be emerging of the United States being unwilling to compromise on, well, anything.
“Nature does not negotiate,” warns UN head on arrival in Copenhagen
(12/15/2009) With talks at the Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen ailing significantly—but by no means hopeless—the UN Secretary-General, Ban-Ki Moon, arrived today announcing: “We do not have another year to negotiate. Nature does not negotiate.”
United States to speed up green technology patents
(12/11/2009) Green technology patents will see a year shaved off the average forty month wait time to approve new patents in the US. The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is implementing a one-year pilot program to push green technology patent applications through the process more quickly, so that the technologies can reach the market faster.
Cite this article
Jeremy Hance (2009). US moves talks forward in Copenhagen with pledge of 100 billion fund, now it’s China’s turn. Mongabay Conservation news. DOI: https://doi.org/10.66709/news-35981Credits
