Up in the Air

By Bill Polits

At a hastily arranged sideshow to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Singapore last Sunday morning, world leaders announced that there does not remain enough time before the Copenhagen global climate conference next month to craft a substantial international agreement on climate change. Danish Prime Minister Laars Lokke Rasmussen, chairman of the climate conference, said that the more limited “politically binding” agreement on emissions targets that would emerge from the Copenhagen conference will have to suffice until a future meeting where more robust regulations could be put in place, possibly in Mexico City in the next year or so.

As reported in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and the Guardian, among the many reasons given for the delay are the wide differences between rich and poor nations and the United States’ inability to pass energy and climate legislation that would set binding targets on carbon emissions. Also listed as reasons for disagreement were continued differences between the positions of leaders in the developing nations and those in the developed countries with respect to what actions would be taken for the rich and poor nations to a) cut emissions and, b) for the rich to help poorer nations develop clean energy infrastructure.

The Impact on Fire Safety

Along with the inability of the US Congress to bring carbon capping legislation to the floor, the current topic is more evidence that climate regulations which might affect the availability of HFCs in fire suppression is still out somewhere on the horizon. Stay tuned for the latest report on the shifting climate winds in Up in the Air.