This week in New York City, the United Nations is holding its second global Water Conference — after a gap of 46 years. At the first meeting in 1977, climate change was not even on the agenda. Today, there is stark evidence that the world is warming and that greenhouse gases from fossil fuels are to blame1,2. At the same time, the global water cycle has been wrecked by decades of mismanagement and intensified by climate change. As a result, 1.5 billion to 2.5 billion people live in areas where water is scarce for at least part of the year1 — and those numbers could double by 2050. Strategies for governing water and addressing climate change in tandem must be higher on the political agenda. This matters for three reasons. First, water is the primary medium through which people experience climate change. Three-quarters of all disasters are water-related3. In the past year alone, massive floods have affected at least two-thirds of Pakistan’s districts; extreme drought has devastated the Horn of Africa; and Europe, the western United States, Australia and parts of Latin America have experienced both extremes. Many of these events have a clear climate-change fingerprint. Along coasts and in deltas, rising seas increase flood risks and bring salt water further inland; at the poles and in the mountains, glaciers and ice sheets are thawing; and, in the tropics, monsoons, heavy rains and droughts are intensifying1.
India’s economy will become carbon neutral by the year 2070, the country’s prime minster has announced at the COP26 climate crisis summit in Glasgow. The target date is two decades beyond what scientists say is needed to avert catastrophic climate impacts. India is the last of the world’s major carbon polluters to announce a net-zero target, with China saying it would reach that goal in 2060, and the United States and the European Union aiming for 2050.
China's carbon emissions are vast and growing, dwarfing those of other countries. Experts agree that without big reductions in China's emissions, the world cannot win the fight against climate change. In 2020, China's President Xi Jinping said his country would aim for its emissions to reach their highest point before 2030 and for carbon neutrality before 2060. His statement has now been confirmed as China's official position ahead of the COP26 global climate summit in Glasgow. But China has not said exactly how these goals will be achieved.
China's carbon emissions are vast and growing, dwarfing those of other countries. Experts agree that without big reductions in China's emissions, the world cannot win the fight against climate change. In 2020, China's President Xi Jinping said his country would aim for its emissions to reach their highest point before 2030 and for carbon neutrality before 2060. His statement has now been confirmed as China's official position ahead of the COP26 global climate summit in Glasgow. But China has not said exactly how these goals will be achieved.
A crucial U.N. conference heard calls on its first day for the world's major economies to keep their promises of financial help to address the climate crisis, while big polluters India and Brazil made new commitments to cut emissions. World leaders, environmental experts and activists all pleaded for decisive action to halt the global warming which threatens the future of the planet at the start of the two-week COP26 summit in the Scottish city of Glasgow on Monday. The task facing negotiators was made even more daunting by the failure of the Group of 20 major industrial nations to agree ambitious new commitments at the weekend.