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Nice post about Kerry's effort on climate change
I saw this on twitter - I don't know anything about the blog itself that put these two articles together with the subject "Kudos to Secretary John Kerry:
http://immasmartypants.blogspot.com/2015/01/kudos-to-secretary-of-state-john-kerry.html?spref=tw
First the post linked to today's news of a climate change agreement with India and then to a year old NYT article that spoke of how this has been a top down strategy by Kerry to work everywhere and anywhere on climate change.
Here is the link on the agreement with India on climate change - http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/01/25/3615232/us-india-climate-agreement/
President Obama and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced on Sunday that the two countries will work together to fight global climate change, laying out a set of goals that the two countries hope “will expand policy dialogues and technical work on clean energy and low greenhouse gas emissions technologies.”
While not a concrete emissions reductions agreement like the one Obama reached with China this past November, the deal includes efforts to cooperate on reducing emissions of fluorinated gases, invigorate India’s promotion of clean energy investment, and partner to reduce the debilitating air pollution that has plagued many of India’s cities.
The agreement also emphasized that the countries would “cooperate closely” for a “successful and ambitious” agreement at the Paris climate talks at the end of the year. During that conference, 196 nations are expected to meet and tentatively agree a course of action to respond to climate change. It is widely considered the last chance for a global agreement that could feasibly keep the rise in global average temperatures under 2°C.
Most of the real information is from a NYT article from January of last year - before the China agreement even started. Interesting to read now that that and a lesser agreement with India has happened.
...while the public’s attention has been on his diplomacy in the Middle East, behind the scenes at the State Department Mr. Kerry has initiated a systematic, top-down push to create an agencywide focus on global warming.
His goal is to become the lead broker of a global climate treaty in 2015 that will commit the United States and other nations to historic reductions in fossil fuel pollution...
Shortly after Mr. Kerry was sworn in last February, he issued a directive that all meetings between senior American diplomats and top foreign officials include a discussion of climate change. He put top climate policy specialists on his State Department personal staff. And he is pursuing smaller climate deals in forums like the Group of 20, the countries that make up the world’s largest economies.
“He’s approaching this creatively,” said Heather Zichal, who recently stepped down as Mr. Obama’s top climate adviser and worked for Mr. Kerry from 2002 to 2008. “He’s thinking strategically about using other forums.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/03/world/asia/kerry-shifts-state-department-focus-to-environment.html
PS This is clearly why, though his heart was with France during the march, he was in India.
PSS From a Davos speech on sustainability, a photo of Kerry and Gore -- given this is on climate change, the image seems to fit.
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