G-8 clearly ignored concrete action on climate change: Pachauri

Chairman of the Nobel- winning UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change R K Pachauri today said the G8 nations had "clearly ignored" taking any concrete action to accomplish its new goal of limiting climate change.

"The certainty with which we can make projections is getting higher and we think it's time for the global community to take action," Pachauri told reporters at a press conference held at the UN headquarters here.    

"We can't put stability and peace at risk by ignoring the impact of climate change," he warned.    

Just back from a meeting in Venice where the panel had begun outlining key developments and proposals for its Fifth Assessment Report, to be released in 2014, Pachauri called for unprecedented global cooperation to come up with the right policy mix to comprehensively tackle the "progressively serious" impacts of climate change.    

Pachauri said the outcome of the G-8 talks in L'Aquila, Italy, featuring the world's largest emitters, had been "mixed (...) a bit of a dichotomy".    

He said the world's wealthiest countries, "clearly ignored what the IPCC came up with" to reach that goal.On one hand, the leaders had agreed to a so-called "aspirational" goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent up to 2050, and to seeing that temperature increase did not exceed 2º C.

"But on the other hand, they haven't taken into account the IPCC's formula that if we want to limit the increase to 2º, we have to ensure that emissions peak no later than 2015," Pachauri said.    

"They pledged deep cuts (in emissions), but they were not specific about what those cuts will be," he said, stressing that he saw "glaring gaps" that needed to be filled between such pronouncements and policy action in the immediate term, and to limit temperature rise by the end of the century, to stabilise atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases at or near current levels.

Responding to questions, he said the clean technologies required to achieve that were already developed or on the verge of commercialization. Also needed was a mix of policies that would spark that kind of development.

As things stood, all countries, rich and poor, would have to adopt measures to adapt to and mitigate the effects of climate change, he said.

"We must look at the effects on sustainable development — that should be the ultimate goal," he added.


On one hand, the leaders had agreed to a so-called "aspirational" goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent up to 2050, and to seeing that temperature increase did not exceed 2º C.    

"But on the other hand, they haven't taken into account the IPCC's formula that if we want to limit the increase to 2º, we have to ensure that emissions peak no later than 2015," Pachauri said.    

"They pledged deep cuts (in emissions), but they were not specific about what those cuts will be," he said, stressing that he saw "glaring gaps" that needed to be filled between such pronouncements and policy action in the immediate term, and to limit temperature rise by the end of the century, to stabilise atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases at or near current levels.

Responding to questions, he said the clean technologies required to achieve that were already developed or on the verge of commercialization. Also needed was a mix of policies that would spark that kind of development.    

As things stood, all countries, rich and poor, would have to adopt measures to adapt to and mitigate the effects of climate change, he said.    

"We must look at the effects on sustainable development — that should be the ultimate goal," he added.