Negotiators emerged from meetings late Friday with French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, the host of the talks, amid an air of optimism that had been lacking just hours earlier. Some delegates wept, others embraced.
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Obama added: “We came together around the strong agreement the world needed”.
More than anything though the deal signifies a new way for the world to achieve progress – without it costing the Earth.
COP 21 – the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties – will see more than 190 nations gather in Paris to discuss a possible new global agreement on climate change, aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions to avoid the threat of risky warming due to human activities.
United States President Barack Obama called the agreement “the best chance we have to save the one planet that we’ve got”.
Play video “What Happens If The World Warms Up?” Negotiators pledged to limit warming to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit.
There is no reference to emissions from shipping and aviation, which account for some 8pc of global greenhouse gas emissions.
“We can not be complacent because of this agreement”, he said. “It’s a whole lot of pomp, given the circumstances”.
Attorney General Ken Paxton already is suing over Obama’s ambitious Clear Power Plan, which seeks to combat global warming by requiring the nation’s existing power plants to slash their carbon emissions. But it allows for some “flexibility” for developing countries that “need it”.
In what would be a victory for small island nations, the draft includes a section highlighting the losses they expect to incur from climate-related disasters that it’s too late to adapt to.
The global climate summit in Paris agreed a landmark accord, setting the course for a “historic” transformation of the world’s fossil fuel-driven economy within decades in a bid to arrest global warming. Reaction came swiftly once the final draft text was released, with supporters of an ambitious pact urging national leaders to adopt it but also to consider last-minute revisions.
Nicaragua said it would not support the pact. “We have in the spirit of compromise agreed on a number of phrases in the agreement”, he said. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, who has been leading the opposition against Obama’s climate change efforts, said the president is waging “war on coal” and a “attack on the middle class”.
“This deal alone won’t dig us out the hole we’re in, but it makes the sides less steep”.
The accord does represent a breakthrough in climate negotiations. He said the world can be more confident this planet is going to be in better shape for the next generation.
The previous emissions treaty, the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, included only rich countries and the USA never signed on. Only developed countries are expected to slash their emissions in absolute terms; developing nations are “encouraged” to do so as their capabilities evolve over time.
Update Dec. 12, 13:30: The final text was accepted unanimously by all 195 countries involved in the negotiations, which makes it another historic first for climate talks. The only way to reach the goal, scientists say, is to eliminate fossil fuels. “China, the largest carbon dioxide emitter will continue to emit for the next 15 years before even considering taking any action”. One mechanism for the transfer of funds has been the Green Climate Fund that was supposed to have a corpus for adaptation of $100 billion per year from 2020.
“With today’s adoption of the climate agreement the global community has for the first time committed itself to the fight against global climate change”, Merkel said in Berlin.
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“It is India’s hope that the Paris Agreement will fulfil the wishes of Mahatma Gandhi who said “We should care for a world we will not see”, he said while thanking as well as congratulating French Presidency for vision and patience.
