A senior EU
figure on climate change has hailed US President Obama's plan to limit the
country's carbon emissions. Obama's announcement came ahead of a global climate
summit in Paris.
Deutsche Welle, 4 Aug 2015
In a series
of statements on Twitter, the European Union's commissioner for climate action
and energy, Miguel Arias Canete, praised the Clean Power Plan, which had been
announced by US President Barack Obama on Monday.
Canete
(pictured) called the plan "a positive step forward" in efforts by
the US - the world's second-biggest carbon polluter after China - to cut down
on its emissions.
2/3 #CleanPowerPlan gives further momentum to #COP21, shows US commitment to underpin its international climate pledge with domestic action
— Miguel Arias Cañete (@MAC_europa) 3 augustus 2015
3/3 The #CleanPowerPlan, IF fully implemented, can boost clean energy and speed up the low-carbon transformation in the US.
— Miguel Arias Cañete (@MAC_europa) 3 augustus 2015
UN leaders
are due to gather in the French capital in four months time for a climate
conference (COP21) with the aim of agreeing on measures to limit global
temperature increases to 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit). The vast
majority of scientists accept that climate change caused by human's creation of greenhouse gases is a grave threat to life on Earth.
Obama's
plan marked the first time power plants in the US have been targeted by
mandatory regulations on carbon dioxide emissions. The measures force power
plant owners to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 32 percent by 2030, compared to
2005 levels.
"We're
the first generation to feel the impact of climate change and the last
generation that can do something about it," Obama told a gathering of
supporters at the White House.
Member
states of the European Union, which is the world's third largest carbon emitter,
have already agreed to cut emissions by 40 percent from 1990 levels by the year
2030.
se/sms (AFP, dpa, Reuters)
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