Thirty years of climate summits: where have they got us?
Highlights and lowlights of Cop since Rio 1992, when countries set up a system to tackle climate crisis
Fiona Harvey Environment correspondent
Sat 11 Jun 2022 07.00 EDT
It has been 30 years since the Rio summit, when a global system was set up that would bring countries together on a regular basis to try to solve the climate crisis. Here are the highlights and lowlights since then.
1
1995: Berlin
After a few years of preparation, the very first conference of the parties took place in Berlin, setting the format for Cops to come. It soon became clear that countries needed a way to put the aims of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change(UNFCCC) – to avoid dangerous anthropogenic interference in the climate system – into practice, through curbs on greenhouse gas emissions.
1997: Kyoto
For the first time, a target was set for reducing greenhouse gas emissions: the aim was to bring them down by about 5%, compared with 1990 levels, by 2012, with all developed countries taking on national targets while developing countries were allowed to continue increasing their emissions.
But the US Congress would not ratify the treaty, which meant the protocol could not come into operation. Cops continued each following year but there seemed to be no way round the central political impasse – .
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jun/11/cop-climate-change-conference-30-years-highlights-lowlights
