Whilst the leaders of the rich world have been widely praised for their agreements on how to beat the world recession this weekend, a real opportunity to do something positive for the environment was missed.
 

The G20 summit, hosted in London, was a gathering of the leaders and finance ministers of the world’s 20 richest nations to agree on a fix for the global financial crisis. Over a trillion dollars was pledged for funding a recovery, and agreements made that have been called “historic” in magnitude. But Gordon Brown and Alastair Darling failed to secure policy on investment into low carbon solutions and clean energy – a big trick missed considering the UK’s renewable energy targets are way off track. 

Climate change got only a brief add on at the end of the nine page document issued by the leaders, with vague language, and discussion delayed until Copenhagen:

Environmental NGOs expressed real disappointment with the outcome. John Sauven, director of Greenpeace, commented: "Tacking climate change on to the end of the communique as an afterthought does not demonstrate anything like the seriousness we needed to see. Hundreds of billions were found for the IMF and World Bank, but for making the transition to a green economy there is no money on the table, just vague aspirations, talks about talks and agreements to agree."

This has been a recurring theme in recent world meetings on the world’s climate, where  resolutions have been put off, and the attitude has been “we’ll sort it out at Copenhagen.” Well, Copenhagen better be good!

For more on this see the independent's article on the matter - http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/hopes-for-climate-treaty-set-back-by-g20s-weasel-words-1662935.html

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