President Obama addressing the United Nations
Climate Summit in New York said: ‘We are the first generation to feel the
effects of climate change and the last generation that can do something about
it.’ The U N Secretary General, Ban
Ki-moon, who had convened the summit, also addressed it. He described climate change ‘as a defining
issue of our age and our response will define our future. To ride this storm we need all hands on
deck’.
The Chairman of the U N’s Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change, which issued its most recent assessment earlier on this year
said that while there are costs in taking the necessary actions they are as
‘nothing compared to the cost of inaction’.
The challenge is to limit the global rise in temperature to two degrees
Celsius. The environmental scientists
tell us that to achieve this our emissions should peak by 2020. If we carry on business as usual our
opportunity to remain below the two degrees limit will slip by. Kiribati, one of the small low-lying islands
states in the Pacific Ocean is seriously threatened by rising sea levels. Its President said at the summit: ‘I’ve been
shouting about climate change for so long I have lost my voice.’
Apart from the massive People’s Climate March and
the U N Climate Summit, perhaps the most significant development in New York on
that same weekend was the announcement by the Rockefellers – heirs to the Esso
fortune – that their philanthropic foundation is to divest from fossil
fuels. The Rockefeller Brothers Fund
controls $860 million (£534 Million) in assets and it is joining a coalition of
investors who will pull a total of $50 Billion (£31 Billion) out of fossil
fuels over the next five years. The fact
that the heirs of John D Rockefeller – whose vast wealth built the Rockefeller
Centre and provided the site for the U N headquarters – are getting out of oil,
coal and gas is a very significant move.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu expressed delight that the World Council of
Churches is planning to do the same. He
said: ‘We can no longer continue feeding our addiction to fossil fuels as if
there were no tomorrow – otherwise there will be no tomorrow.’
Momentum for action has been taking a massive leap
forward in recent weeks. Over one
thousand companies have subscribed to a World Bank initiative to put a price on
carbon emissions and many are putting greater investment into cutting their own
emissions. The world at large is
becoming gradually more convinced that there is barely enough time left to
prevent catastrophic climate change. It
is not just government policies and business policies that need to change. All of us can and must play our part in
safeguarding our planet so that those who come after us will not inherit an
even more blighted environment.
I would like to thank you most sincerely for the
extraordinary way you have responded to the appeal to enable Solar Panels to be
placed on the South-facing roof of our church.
Over the past two months you have donated about £28,000 most of which
has been Gift Aided. If we receive
planning permission we will be able to proceed with plans to put as many panels
in place as we can – which hopefully will be a sizeable number. Let us hope the planning authorities will look
positively on our application and thank you once again for your magnificent
response which will enable the Parish to move away from reliance on fossil
fuels.
