Big names drop in to pile on pressure
California´s Governor Schwarzenegger joined the mayors (Photo: Hasse Ferrold)Cities are on the front line of making effective and immediate changes for sustainable living argue world’s mayors
The Climate Summit for Mayors opened in Copenhagen today with some harsh figures showing just why cities and local governments should be included in the UN climate agreement to be reached later this week.
Urban areas account for at least two-thirds of CO2 emissions and more than half the world’s population live in cities.
Mayors and local government leaders from more than 80 cities present at the opening session yesterday morning, called on negotiators at COP15 to seriously consider the role of cities in a future agreement.
And it wasn’t just mayors such as Michael Bloomberg of New York, Boris Johnson of London or David Miller of Toronto lending their united voices, but they also had the heavy-weight backing of former US President Bill Clinton, who appeared at the conference in a video message.
“Cities are a very important part of the overall fight against climate change,” Clinton said.
The former president assured mayors to continue with plans of sustainable green growth and promoted the use of large scale projects that will help create new jobs in an economic crisis.
His message was echoed by Mayor Bloomberg, who is well aware of the economic pressures facing local government when his city faced a $4 billion deficit earlier this year.
“Recessions are when we should be more environmentally-friendly – this is exactly the right time.”
Bloomberg highlighted New York’s focus on renovating existing buildings to make them more energy-efficient and help cut emission levels by 30 percent by 2030.
The overriding message from mayors was that local governments can implement immediate and effective changes within transport, infrastructure and waste management.
“We deal everyday with the people and we can’t sit around for the federal national governments to act,” Bloomberg said.
The message of the cities has already been passed on to negotiators in the form of the Climate Catalogue, which documents 3200 targets set by more than 2800 cities to reduce greenhouse gases.
But meanwhile, the mayors were keen to point out their successes and projects for the public, sometimes at the expense of the host Copenhagen Mayor, Ritt Bjerregaard.
Bloomberg as the 17th richest man in the world (as listed by Forbes) was always going to be a big draw and despite his unassuming quietly confident manner, managed to overshadow Bjerregaard’s opening address as photographers clamoured for his snapshot in the front row.
But probably the most poignant message of the opening day came from Dar es Salaam mayor, Adam Kimbasi, who urged cities and nations to stop the climate injustice plaguing his city and others like it.
According to Kimbasi, many developing world cities are being flooded with climate refugees that they cannot accommodate.
“The young unemployed become a breeding ground for violence and extremism. Someone, somewhere, has to do something. We can’t just stand by and only listen,” he implored. (kr)
