#COP21 Delivers On Its Promise And Really Changes Everything
After reading the reports out of Paris today I think we can call this #COP21 (even though its not quite over) as nothing
short of a miracle. An amazing victory for diplomacy, common sense and the collective will of Civil Society throughout
planet earth,
To re-use Naomi Klein's book title "This Changes Everything."
Even non-binding global commitments to take the world to Carbon Zero by 2050 will be enough to start real change
occurring everywhere, to everything. And that is what the world is about to agree to. The detail isn't yet done which
will enable us to deliver on this objective but rather than aim low the world has in Paris agreed to aim high.
Two weeks ago global hope in diplomacy and our ability to act collectively in everybody's best interests was suffering
something akin to cardiac arrest. This past week Paris has delivered some much needed CPR to the hopes and dreams of 7
billion people.
Meanwhile back in NZ, while our Government may have been one of the last nations on the planet to join the "High
Ambition" group of nations which agreed to the Pacific Island's push for a 1.5 degree temperature target - even we
eventually did so.
And in doing so the NZ Government's approach to climate change will need to be sent back to the drawing board - where it
most definitely belongs.
Well done France. Well done world.
Well done activists. Well done diplomats. And even well done to the hitherto fossilised democracies of the western world
which have till this past few days shown very little capacity to address serious issues without nit-picking about
everything through a self-interested lens.
We all need this. Each and every person on the planet.
Thankyou universe.
Today (well actually tomorrow - when these talks conclude) will be a day to remember for generations to come.
-News Comment from Out-going Scoop Editor Alastair Thompson, posted from Gili Trawangan in Indonesia.