Family Life

12.07.09 | FL News Team

Climate talks, said to be the largest-ever, have begun in Copenhagen.

Participants from at least 190 nations, including the leaders of 105 countries, are expected to discuss ways to reduce harmful CO2 emissions and limit other global warming dangers, such as rising ocean levels and increasingly intense storms. The goal is for every nation in attendance to agree on greenhouse gas emission reductions. Wealthy nations will probably contribute billions of dollars to poorer nations to help them develop clean technologies. Leaders of the top greenhouse gas emitters, the U.S., China, Russia and India have all promised to curb emissions, and the leaders of those nations will all be on hand in Denmark. President Obama will visit the conference on its final day, December 18th.

 The main objective of the Copenhagen summit is to reach a binding deal for emissions and to set a deadline sometime in 2010 to have all the legal details hammered out. The United Nations has lobbied for deep cuts in greenhouse emissions by developed nations by 2020 and for an immediate ten-billion dollars a year to help less developed nations cope. The Copenhagen Protocol will replace the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.