Australia’s Chief Climate Commissioner, Tim Flannery, stopped by KQED this morning for an appearance on Forum, the station’s live call-in program. He spoke about the status of international climate agreements and expressed hope for the process, not something I came across very often as a reporter at the UN climate talks in Cancun last December.
“We’re slowly gaining the ability to cooperate globally,” he told KQED’s Michael Krasny. “It’s a race against time, and whether we win or not is an open question.”
Flannery cited China’s investments in renewable energy and India’s tax on coal as evidence that the world is slowly beginning to take more steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in efforts to fight climate change.
“Even the poorest countries are doing things,” he said. “The rest of the world is moving, and the United States and Canada are the laggards.”
He noted that while California is ahead of the game with its plans for launching a cap and trade program next year, “a national approach is necessary.”