Under the Paris Agreement, states submit Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) outlining their commitments to reducing emissions. These documents are important window in the international politicization of climate change policy.
Here was my Tweet the other day. Today we have an answer. Tweeps, best case scenario on climate coming out of APEC? — Josh Busby (@busbyj2) November 7, 2014 If you went to bed early on Tuesday...
One of this weeks big news items in international relations was the progress that China and the United States had made in their bilateral climate talks (gated but free registration available). While...
Following on my round of links on Thursday, this is a guest post from Jennifer Hadden from the University of Maryland who is in Warsaw at the global climate negotiations (follow her on Twitter...
The annual climate negotiations are going on at the moment in Warsaw, Poland. For long-time observers of the process, they have a Groundhog Day-esque quality to them. Every year the same issues seem to come up again and again, and it's unclear if there has been any meaningful progress or if each negotiation is more or less a replay of what transpired the previous year, with divisions between developed and developing countries almost always ever-present. Rich countries aren't doing enough while poor countries and environmental activists are demanding greater action because there is a climate...
Aside from some abortion rights Texas senate filibuster coverage, this week's morning linkage is all about climate change and President Obama's Tuesday speech at Georgetown University. The announced plan aims to use existing executive branch authority, including the EPA's ability to regulate pollutants under the Clean Air Act, to initiate measures to control carbon pollution and other greenhouse gases. This move obviates the need for additional legislative action, which isn't going to happen with this Congress. Beyond the headline announcement for new controls on power plants, the plan has a...
I gave a guest lecture for undergraduates on the state of global climate negotiations yesterday for a law school colleague here at the University of Texas. In light of the president's strong but ambiguous comments in the State of the Union last night threatening executive action if the Congress doesn't act, I thought I'd share my notes here and would welcome comments from others about whether I've done justice to the arc of negotiations. My aim was to bring a group of 20 year olds up to speed so that they could understand how we got from the 1992 Framework Convention to last year's...