
At plastics treaty talks, geopolitical theater for a polluted material world
A handful of fossil fuel producing countries, petrochemical industries and lobbyists show no interest in a strong, restrictive and legally binding instrument.
A handful of fossil fuel producing countries, petrochemical industries and lobbyists show no interest in a strong, restrictive and legally binding instrument.
Emissions must decrease 42% by 2030 to keep the 1.5° target alive. Instead, they're expected to rise 3% by then.
Oil and plastic producing nations and lobbyists sought more emphasis on recycling instead of production cuts.
This is the third round of talks to develop an international legally binding deal that includes plastic waste in the ocean.
Government plans would blow past limits needed to limit warming to 1.5° Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
Two U.N. reports show how that more climate aid for developing nations could reduce the millions of deaths a year from climate shocks.
The ship-to-ship transfer extracted as much of the 1.14 million barrels of oil as possible, leaving under 2% aboard.
As climate litigation increases, the body of legal precedent grows, forming an increasingly well-defined field of law.
Without U.N. intervention, the tanker could have released as much as four times the oil spilled by the Exxon Valdez in 1989.
The summit ended with support for creating a "zero draft" treaty ahead of the next negotiations at Nairobi in November.
About 69% of all the plastics produced, mainly through fossil fuel burning, are used just once or twice before they are thrown away. About 22% is mismanaged. Just 9% is recycled.
The estimated annual social and environmental costs of plastic pollution range from US$300 billion to $US1.5 trillion.
Virtually all the world's nations are negotiating proposals under the legally binding Basel, Rotterdam and Stockholm Conventions to limit toxic chemicals, pollutants and wastes.
The head of the U.N.'s Nobel Prize-winning panel of climate experts called for quick action because "make no mistake, inaction and delays are not listed as options."
The stranded supertanker FSO Safer has been moored off the coast of Yemen – toward the end of a pipeline to the oil and gas fields near Marib city – and nearly sank in 2020.
Fed by pollution and climate change, strains of bacteria immune to all known antibiotics may become a major cause of death by mid-century, says the U.N. environment agency.