Germany’s Merkel: World is Heading toward Disastrous Heating unless Rich Countries Drastically Cut CO2

By Benjamin Wehrmann | –

The earth’s surface temperature will rise by three degrees Celsius [5.4° F.] under current climate targets, meaning CO2 emissions targets especially of industrialised countries have to be adjusted, Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel said at an event hosted by the country’s development cooperation ministry (BMZ) in Berlin.

“Our targets are not where they should be,” Merkel said, adding that Germany is among the countries using a much bigger share of the world’s natural resources than it should to remain sustainable.

“Twenty percent of all people in the world consume eighty percent of the resources,” she said in a video of her speech published by news magazine Stern, arguing that nations with a comparatively high CO2 output have a special responsibility to act against global warming.

A temperature rise by three degrees would exceed the two-degree target that signatory nations of the Paris Climate Agreement set themselves in 2015 and would gravely exacerbate the effects of climate change on the environment and human life.

At a policy briefing ahead of the UN climate summit COP25 in Spain on the same day, Germany’s environment minister Svenja Schulze and foreign minister Heiko Maas both called for more ambitious climate targets for the European Union, which they said should act as a role-model to encourage other countries to also ramp up their national targets (NDCs) at the 2020 COP.

Schulze said the 2030 EU target should be increased from currently 40 percent reduction with respect to 1990 levels to up to 55 percent.

Benjamin Wehrmann is staff Correspondent for Clean Energy Wire. Before joining CLEW’s editorial staff, he worked for the AFP news agency in Berlin, Paris and Frankfurt, reporting mainly on domestic politics and economics. He also used to work for the German n-tv news channel as well as for dpa news agency in France. Benjamin holds a joint degree in political science from University of Bath, Sciences Po Paris and FU Berlin and a degree in economics and social sciences from FU Bolzano.

Via Clean Energy Wire

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Bonus video added by Informed Comment:

AP: “German govt. agrees big climate change deal”