just had a chance to go back and look at Gore's speech to congress about the treaty talks coming up in December in Copenhagen.
In order to regain its credibility "and enter the Copenhagen treaty talks with a renewed authority to lead the world in shaping a fair and effective treaty", the United States needs to build its own capacity to generate clean electricity and subsequently institute a national cap-and-trade system for CO2-emissions, Gore said.
As a means to this end, Gore advocated a quick pass in Congress of President Barack Obama's Recovery package which envisages unprecedented investments in four key areas: energy efficiency, renewables, a unified national energy grid and the move to clean cars.
Other nations around the world have already become leaders in demanding action and taking bold steps on their own.
"Brazil has proposed an impressive new plan to halt the destructive deforestation in that nation. Indonesia has emerged as a new constructive force in the talks. And China's leaders have gained a strong understanding of the need for action and have already begun important new initiatives," Gore said.
According to Al Gore, the key elements to a successful agreement in Copenhagen include:
- Strong targets and timetables from industrialized countries and differentiated but binding commitments from developing countries that put the entire world under a system with one commitment: to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other global warming pollutants that cause the climate crisis;
- The inclusion of deforestation, which alone accounts for twenty percent of the emissions that cause global warming;
- The addition of sinks including those from soils, principally from farmlands and grazing lands with appropriate methodologies and accounting. Farmers and ranchers in the U.S. and around the world need to know that they can be part of the solution;
- The assurance that developing countries will have access to mechanisms and resources that will help them adapt to the worst impacts of the climate crisis and technologies to solve the problem; and,
- A strong compliance and verification regime.
"The road to Copenhagen is not easy, but we have traversed this ground before," Al Gore said.
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