The White House is claiming the G7 has a long-term vision of “decarbonizing” major world economies by the end of this century.
.@WhiteHouse on G7 summit: “G-7 Leaders also articulated a long-term vision for decarbonizing our economies by the end of the century.”
— Zack Colman (@zcolman) June 8, 2015
G7 leaders from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States have called for cutting carbon dioxide emissions 40 to 70 percent by the middle of the century, basically phasing them out by 2100. The G7 reaffirmed its support for the United Nations’ goal of keeping global warming to 2 degrees Celsius by the end of this century.
Obama told reporters in a press conference Monday that the G7 countries have all finalized their post-2020 carbon dioxide reductions targets for the United Nations. The president added that G7 countries have agreed to increase climate aid and insurance to poor countries along with boosting green energy funding to Africa.
The G7 is a meeting of leaders, finance ministers and central bankers from seven of the world’s most advanced economies to discuss major public policy issues. This year, President Obama has put a particular focus on tackling global warming for this year’s meeting.
“Urgent and concrete action is needed to address climate change,” G7 officials said in a statement after meeting for two days in Germany. “We emphasise that deep cuts in global greenhouse gas emissions are required with a decarbonisation of the global economy over the course of this century.”
Obama has made signing a global climate agreement a major part of his last years in office. The administration has been working tirelessly behind the scenes to convince allies and trading partners to agree to deep emissions cuts ahead of this winter’s U.N. climate summit in Paris.
The president claimed a major victory last year when he and China’s government announced global warming commitments. China said it would peak greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and Obama committed the U.S. to cutting emissions 26 to 28 percent by 2025.
Republicans, however, have opposed Obama’s climate plans, and vowed to block any U.N. agreement the president hopes to bind Americans to. The only problem for Republicans is that Obama is unlikely to bring any climate agreement before the Senate for approval — the president is looking for ways to bypass Congress on a climate deal.
“If I can encourage and gain commitments from the Chinese to put forward a serious plan to start curbing their greenhouse gases, and that then allows us to leverage the entire world for the conference that will be taking place later this year in Paris,” Obama told VICE News in an interview.
“When I’m done, we’re still going to have a heck of a problem, but we will have made enough progress that the next president and the next generation can start building on it,” Obama said.
Obama’s climate push has seen mixed results. While the president did get a vague commitment from China, the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter, the White House failed to get the support of India, the world’s third-largest emitter.
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