Now that the United Nations climate is over, the focus is on progress. One SUNY Environmental Science and Forestry professor of Ecological Economics and Social-Ecological Systems saw new ground covered since the Paris Climate summit six years ago. Professor Valarie Luzadis, Ph.D., is also Chair of the Global Council for Science and the Environment. She spoke with WAER’s Chris Bolt about progress made during COP-26.
Among her observations after monitoring much of the two-week negotiations, the conversation included strategies for mitigation to keep global warming in check, but also expanded.
“This time there were also sessions on adaptation … and there’s a work program agreed to gong forward. And a new segment this time is looking at loss and damage related to ongoing traumas related to climate change,” Luzadis said.
Of course, conversation at the COP 26 summit included the expanding impacts already being seen from climate change, as well as future concerns as the global average temperature rises.
“We do see extreme weather events, here in the U.S., and we also see extreme wildfire events and those things have been directly liked to climate change now. In fact, I saw a (statistic) that 1 in 3 people in the U.S. had experience with an extreme weather event related to climate change.”
Luzadis adds projections of climate impacts include widespread effects that serve as a call to action.
“If we limit to just 1.5 degrees Celsius increase in temperature, were looking at a 70% loss of all coral reefs. If we increase to 2.0 degrees, which is what we’re more on target to do, … we’ll lose them all. That’s a huge difference; that’s a major, major change in our oceans.”
She adds between 700-million and 2-billion people worldwide could feel the impacts of extreme heat, including the prospect of climate migration. Her expertise is in the financial impacts and strategies around climate change, which was also a larger part of the recent climate summit.
“We not only need financing for mitigation, but we now need financing for adaptation and for loss and damage that has already occurring. … Moving fully away from coal and stopping subsidies for fossil fuels, that will make changes for us as well,” Luzadis said.
She adds New York State’s climate goals and policies both support and are supported by agreements made at the global level between countries. In fact, she says much of the progress is being made at the local level, especially during the four years when the U.S. was largely absent in global climate crisis strategy.
Luzadis came away somewhat optimistic as she sees attitudes toward taking action against the climate crisis changing.
“Most people in the US understand that climate change is a real thing and we need to deal with it – it doesn’t matter what party they are. … And so that base agreement among most people is something, I think, we should have more attention to. And that is a hopeful thing.”