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AN TAOISEACH ENDA Kenny has called on world leaders to show “conviction, clarity, courage and consistency” in their response to climate change.
Kenny was speaking at the UN Climate Summit taking place in New York.
He noted the urgency of the situation, stating: “The hand of the future beckons, the clock ticks and we have no time to waste.”
“Global warming is a stark reality that can only be dealt with by a collective global response. We are all interdependent and interconnected … we share a common humanity… and each of us must play our part.
“Leaders, Governments and corporations have a responsibility to define objectives, make policy decisions and take action to preserve our planet and secure a prosperous future for its inhabitants.”
Speaking to RTÉ News, Kenny said that Ireland wants to “contribute as part of the European debate” on climate change.
“Sustainability for the future is absolutely central to the decisions that have to be made.”
Kenneth Matthews, CEO of the Irish Wind Energy Association, welcomed Kenny’s comments.
This UN summit clearly highlights an overwhelming hunger among global leaders including An Taoiseach Enda Kenny for a safe, secure and sustainable energy future.
“Irish renewable energy sources, led by wind energy, are already playing a critical role in the delivery of that clean future, but there’s more to do.
“Ireland can be a clean energy superpower, we were recently ranked fourth in a global survey of wind energy leaders carried out by the Earth Policy Institute ahead of Germany, the UK, the US and China.”
Some 120 world leaders, including Barack Obama and Angela Merkel, attended the summit. Each had just four minutes to speak.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told delegates: ”Today, we must set the world on a new course … I am asking you to lead.”
French President Francois Hollande pledged to donate €1billion to help developing countries deal with climate change issues.
The summit marks the first high-level climate change gathering since a Copenhagen conference ended in disagreement in 2009.
United Nations / TwitterSee more behind-the-scenes photos like these from today's #Climate2014 summit here: http://t.co/PVZmulLw6f pic.twitter.com/7pwFBMGRNx
— United Nations (@UN) September 23, 2014
During his brief speech today Kenny also said that Ireland would be signing up to the Global Alliance on Climate Smart Agriculture Alliances (GACSA).
Speaking after the Taoiseach made his comments, Sorley McCaughey, Head of Advocacy and Policy at Christian Aid, said that while the organisation agreed with many of the proposals being put forward by GACSA, it could not endorse it until some of its “weaknesses” were addressed.
There has been a lack of any kind of substantive engagement thus far with small-scale farmers and their representative organisations, especially those engaged in developing and promoting environmentally sustainable models of agricultural production.
“The conversations so far have been dominated by global policymakers, large-scale farming, agro-chemical and food retailing corporations. This, to us and the people we work with, is a major flaw,” McCaughey stated.
Additional reporting: AFP
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Your grand Enda,
No one else thinks the sun shines out of your H@le…….
Ah the wind energy cheer leaders fighting to keep their subsidises by blowing bubbles up Indas hole.
Climate Change, Revenue Gains.
So, faced with business as usual leading to what has been described by the scientific community as irreversible and catastrophic climate change, you can only think about the possibility of being taxed more? Really?!
Other than increased taxes what has been done here, Quick answer – NOTHING.
There is so much that can be done to conserve energy – so much is just wasted for no benefit at all…
I would like to see the Government insulate everybody’s house either free or for a very small amount that you can pay back on your energy bill over time. The Warmer Homes scheme is there for free insulation if you are on benefits and low income, but they need to do this for every single household.
They can bring in much more stringent energy conservation measures and incentives to stop businesses wasting energy – eg supermarkets. We can have solar on every public building.
Invest in public transport – nobody in London bothers driving since they have the congestion charge in central London and the public transport system is so superb and joined up.
There is a whole lot the Government can do – even if they do tax people on profligate energy use they should ringfence the money to pay for energy conservation works for those who want to take energy conservation measures. Everybody will benefit and we can create so many jobs too…
It just takes a commitment and they can do it. In the end it has been shown that action now will be much cheaper than expensive mitigation in a decade or two…
plus we will be safeguarding our children’s future… a moral imperative…
Maybe Enda can find out about this fiddle at NASA/GISS ?
The warmest year in the last 100 was 1934 as measured at Dublin Airport amongst other places. The data was on the NASA/GISS website until James Hansen ‘retired’ but for some reason all this was deleted when he left. Try this link and you will see what I mean. http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/gistemp_station.py?id=621039690003&data_set=0&num_neighbors=1
That notice has been up since April 2013, can you accept that NASA could not have sorted the ‘technical problem’ in over a year ?
That is one of two links that showed the dtat before and after it was tampered with. I have some of it saved.
“and each of us must play our part.”
And so i am increasing excise duty by 20c on all fuel, to save the planet and Mayo.
Your wild conspiracy theories are getting ridiculous – everybody else is out of line except you, is that it? And all of the thousands of different reputable organisations around the world collecting measurements at hundreds of thousands of locations are all corrupt liars making up their evidence (with remarkable similarity) – I would imagine if they are doing that then the dark forces who are illegally hacking into everybody’s emails would have found out, don’t you think?
Face it, all the met offices, international atmospheric and oceanic associations, yes NASA too, all agree that August 2014 was the hottest globally since records began in the 1800s.
It’s desperate to be picking on one thing as proof of what would be a gigantic global conspiracy of unbelievable proportions. Why don’t you ask NASA for an explanation of what you allege is the case with one statistic?
A change of government would be more welcome.
He should call a new election!!!
Population growth so far this year 59,500,000 this is what we must deal with first. All aid to the Third World must be contingent on them following strict family planning guidelines. As Twink used to say, time to zip it up guys if you want our money.
it should be contingent on the First World reducing our profligate consumption
The only way the third world will stem population growth and carbon emissions is to allow them to develop and industrialise, something the IPCC would not want them to do.
Developed country’s have lower birth rates as third world country’s tend to have bigger family’s to help work and provide an income. industrialised country’s tend to be greener as they are not chopping down tree’s to fuel their industries. The more climate activists suppress third worlds and stop them from developing the worse its going to get. Why do you think China and India were not at this summit.
christ, how could someone think that?
Population is a problem but we cannot, like China, force people not to have children. I also find it a bit sad to hear such a statement as “zip it up guys if you want our money” – it’s like a jackboot on the neck of the poor people of the world who are suffering horrible because of the emissions of people like us and whose carbon emissions are miniscule compared to ours… for shame…
People are dying from hunger as food is turned into fuel as part of the scam
No green person agrees that land that could be used for food should be used for biofuel! It is the people who want to keep driving at all costs to the planet that believe that! Electric cars (with sustainably generated electricity) are the only way forward…
In any case, it is a lie to say that this is the reason people are dying from hunger. The Arab Spring, war in Syria and rising conflict in general are linked to hunger caused by drought from climate change. If it’s this bad now, it is a frightening prospect for the future. See this report from a respected military advisory board on Climate Change as a Catalyst for Conflict – very interesting reading. http://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2014/09/climate-change-as-catalyst-of-conflict/
Anybody who truly cares about people who are dying of hunger would be fighting to stop climate change – all our Irish aid agencies (Trocaire etc) are fighting hard for this as they recognise the huge injustice of people dying from drought and catastrophes such as Typhoon Hayan (highest wind speeds ever recorded), due to climate change.
@michellerogers
No need for any forcing, just cut off the aid.
Took him a day-and-a-half to learn those lines.
And a minute to forget them.
Drop global temperatures in a heartbeat – politicians stop blowing hot air out their ….
No warming for =20 years now, the sky is not falling
Why do you persist with this when the world’s scientific community disagrees with you – why would you expect anybody to believe you over them. August 2014 was the hottest August since records began in the 1880s! Or do you think all the world’s meteorological societies, oceanic and atmospheric associations are all lying about their records???
And here are the records for 2013:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/summary-info
Give it up, will ya?
@Michelle – sorry Michelle – it was 1934.
Why didn’t he stay at home and not contribute to global warming with all the air travel he does.
why could then not all skype in conference and save a whole heap of carbon
Wind, wave energy and electric cars should be a given here by now- but Enda has failed on all counts. Too many fossils fuelling the Dail methinks…
Do u lads have any pic of our esteemed leader where he doesn’t look like a total doofus?
Best foot forward. And stuff
ahh the elusive holy grail. Good luck with that one
It’s all well and good, cutting Enda up, but the fact of the matter is, that he was voted in by the people of this country, people believed that he was the man for the job….. HE WASNT!!! yet he still got in,,, Folks wise up a small bit, they are all the same…. FACT!!!
Well the Hampster has squeaked so the world will listen
” show “conviction, clarity, courage and consistency” ” Someone should tell Kenny or his advisers that hot air contributes to climate change….
I think End a should set a good example, reduce his carbon footprint and get a row boat back from New York.
“Enda” damn autocorrect!!
Looks better as End a!
You have to admire Enda. He really does walk the talk – attending a Climate Summit and demonstrating such skill in recycling cliches that everyone thought were beyond further use.
Just another talking shop. Politicians doing what they do best while the real policies are dictated by multinational corporations and global banks. Nothing will be done that will be effective enough to stem the climate catastrophe we are facing. 2014 is already on coarse to be the warmest year on record.
Bring on the warmth. Humans do better in warmer environments. Just look back at the medieval warming period, we flourished then and temperatures were hotter.
I know John, it is an utter tragedy…
Not true medieval warming period warmer – temperatures have risen well-beyond those achieved during the Medieval Warm Period across most of the globe. The National Academy of Sciences Report on Climate Reconstructions in 2006 found it plausible that current temperatures are hotter than during the Medieval Warm Period. Further evidence obtained since 2006 suggests that even in the Northern Hemisphere where the Medieval Warm Period was the most visible, temperatures are now beyond those experienced during Medieval times. This was also confirmed by a major paper from 78 scientists representing 60 scientific institutions around the world in 2013.
Oh holy hand of divine Jaysus, how much more can we suffer? Indah is addressing the conference on climate change – on our behalf? Has he warned them to be frugal when “washing their teeth “? Sometimes the humiliation gets a bit too much, sorry folks.
eh, pardon my ignorance, but aren’t Ireland way behind the agreed level we agreed? Can hardly Blame dear ‘aul Enda though (I swear). Politics is not about the need of it’s people, its responding safely to public opinion. Why can’t politics be straight up “no Bull” rather than sugar coated pantomime you know it is?? So frustrating …
so far behind that we are being fine’d for excess plant food production , but don’t worry we can pay our way out of it with carbon credits. Tesla are making a fortune from selling carbon credits. maybe we should get on that bandwagon, looks like a nice earner
We do always hear a lot of hot air, alright, but hopefully we will get some action this time – if we screw it up we will bequeath to our children a planet that will not be able to sustain them, and because of the time lag between emissions and their effects there will be nothing they can do about it.
It is another example of the rich and powerful multi-nationals not giving a toss about the ordinary person or the future of humankind so long as they get their profits. We need to get off fossil fuels – they are getting more expensive all the time anyway and peak oil is around the corner.
hopefully it will just be the same as the last one and loose traction. a no decision as no country want to cut is energy output. so stale mate while governments collect billions in tax’s under the guise of trying to do the right thing.
Fossil fuels are massively subsidised by governments to the tune of tens of billions – perhaps that should stop and we should invest instead in clean energy. The fact is that, no matter how much we may not like tax, we have to find SOME solution and play our part in cutting our emissions – no matter how we do it – otherwise we can not look our children in eyes because, with business as usual we are heading for 4-6 degrees of global climate change, which will be irreversible and catastrophic for life on earth. Let’s get a grip here – the next generation will be powerless to act, as it will be too late.
Climate change is as normal, this political and financial fraud is collapsing
You just keep trotting out these crazy statements with no evidence! The fact is that the whole world is getting on board with this important project, every branch of science disagrees with you, and the only people still trying to deny the evidence are the fossil fuel industry – and even many of them are slowly changing the story – now they are saying OK there is manmade global warming but it’s not so bad… really!
@Michelle – …and wind isn’t subsidised at all Michelle, isn’t that right.
The only compensation I have found, so far, to getting older is that with any luck at all I will be dead before the full effects of climate change begin to be felt. Then it won’t matter who were the biggest smart arses on the Internet fora, and I won’t be around to have a good laugh at the climate change deniers when they are proved wrong. I am glad that I will miss the changes in sea levels: the boundless and fruitful oceans reduced to empty wastelands, totally because of human activity: and the final extinction of so many of our fellow creatures who were every bit as valuable and unique as we like to think we are. I wish it was in my power to prevent these things, but I cannot. The only thing I can do is be glad that I won’t have to see it.
Over a 10-year period methane causes 130 times more global warming than CO2, over 5-years it is closer to 200 times. One cow emits approximately 125kg methane x 130 x 1m = 16m 250k tons CO2, more than released by burning 5 million tons of oil. Yet the stated policy of all Irish political parties is to increase the national herd while in parallel spend billions and in the achieving far smaller reductions of greenhouse gas from power plants, cars, etc. Can any supporter of the current policies explain the logic?
This climate change business is now driven by the ever higher sales and profit targets of large companies forced by government policies to manufacture and use renewable energy equipment. It is all about making money, the consultants who write reports all collude to create a common narrative as demanded by the spineless political sheep. What a con job, all paid for by the useful idiot tax payer and consumer.
Methane is indeed a much more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 (but much shorter lived in its effect – CO2 will keep magnifying its effects for a few hundred years in the atmosphere). The big increase in greenhouse gases in the past decades has however been CO2 – not methane.
I am glad you raise methane, because there are massive amounts of methane trapped in huge areas of permafrost around the planet, and it is already starting to melt due to global warming from CO2 emissions – it if all melts we are truly, as Emma Thompson says, bugg*red.
The rise in CO2 emissions in the last hundred years is staggering and since it is a greenhouse gas that has long-term effects (ie once you know how bad it is, even if you stop emitting it, it will go on having an effect for hundreds of years, thus tipping you over into runaway climate change, domino effects etc) we need to cut our emissions drastically in a short timeframe. That’s what the scientific community thinks too.
Methane is not short lived, over 10-years it is 130 time more damanging than CO2 (and over 20-years the figure is 83 times). Releasing metane is not a one-off event, more is added each day by our cattle herd causing a far more rapid build-up. Why are you focused on what might happen in decades or hunderds of years due to CO2 or melting ice but ignore methane release from cattle which is a more serious immediate problem? Are you serious about damage to the atmosphere or just anti-fossil fuel even though for Ireland our cows are a far more pollution serious issue both due to methane and cronic ground water pollution which has rendered the water in 30% of our nation’s wells undrinkable?
I said methane is NOT as long lived in effect as CO2 – that is absolutely true! I agree about the cattle – using land to grow food to feed cattle is not going to be sustainable in a future earth.
I do care about preserving the conditions for life on earth for future generations – the trouble is that CO2 is a huge problem and if we don’t tackle it now it will lead to domino effects that will lead to an earth that is hostile to human life.
Methane is already being released from permafrost that is warming – this is not a future scenario – but if, in within say 20 or 30 years, a lot is released, that is a nightmare scenario.
@Michelle – “runaway climate change” – Oh Please!
The clock is ticking down to the next election and that’s the only clock politicians worry about. The French economy is in tatters and Hollande uses his 4 minutes to pledge a billion they can’t afford to trump himself up on the world stage, at least Enda kept it simple in order not to get jumbled up.
Enda the clown, no China or India at the summit so it’s a waste of time.
They are there, just not their leaders. We are ALL going to have to do our bit to avert disaster, even us smaller countries, since we have among the highest emissions per capita in the world.
http://www.dailymotion.com/embed/video/x26hhkz
Really funny video – Jon Stewart takes the p1ss out of Republicans who are (unbelievably) on the house Science Committee, discussing climate change…
Hmm… No temperature rises for 17 years. That 17 year span also accounts for 25% of all emissions to date since the English Industrial Revolution.
Oh wait, I here someone saying the temperature rises have been absorbed by the oceans. Lol. Ah God.
Horgay, your bizarre assertions run directly counter to the view of the world’s scientific community, and even now business community and, well, basically everybody. This August has been the hottest globally since records began in 1880. The oceans have indeed absorbed a lot of CO2 – that’s why the plankton at the bottom of the oceanic food chain are starting to not be able to make their (alkaline) shells – most of the earth’s oxygen comes from phytoplankton, so, apart from killing the entire oceanic food chain, it all round is very scary indeed – how can you make fun of this horrific stuff?
Global warning wasn’t working!
So now it’s called climate change because they realised that it’s not really getting hotter. According to al gore it should be as hot as the sun by now and we should basically be living like Kevin Costner in water world!!!!!!
Are you SERIOUS???!!! They mean different things. Both terms have been around for a very long time (the clue is in the CC in the IPCC!)… It IS getting hotter – August was the hottest month globally since records began in the 1880s! The scientific view is that business as usual will lead to 4-6 degrees rise in temperatures, which will lead to runaway climate change that will be irreversible and catastrophic. For those who do not believe the robust evidence supported by every single reputable scientific institution in the world, there is nothing to say.
Ah sher seeming the world wide recession is becoming a thing of the past it’s time to bring the ole climate change card back out after a 6 yr hiatus.
Not sure what you mean by a six-year hiatus? When you say the ole climate change card, do I detect that you are trying to suggest that scientists have NOT been working hard on this issue all round the world for many decades, and have continued to do so in the last six years too! It is to all our shame that, knowing the drastic things we were doing to our climate, we have continued for decades more since the red flags were first raised.
Massive increase to Carbon Tax will sort it
I don’t think that is the way to go – we should be pushing our Government to invest in renewable energy – eg offshore wind, solar. And also insulation.
@michelle – all subsidised of course.
I’m calling for urgent economic action.
It´s interesting to see how people react. The concerns about tax are understandable considering other tax burdens on the people and how that is distributed. Different approaches are of course possible. However, denying the science of climate change is throwing out rationality itself, climate change is fully accepted in scientific circles. It was even accepted under the Bush Republican administration who couldn´t find scientific arguments to disagree. If you have an interest or questions do look for yourself, but the road of denial is not a good one. A country where rational arguments, evidence and balance is thrown out for whims and canards is a country where it is very easy to control the people and tax or legislate in any way the powerful see fit. Be careful what you wish for.
hi Lorna – let the Taoiseach and his Whip show their hands on “fracking” -it seems the present gov supports “fracking”-yes the clock is ticking and “fracking” is a clime bomb- what a waffler
This should truly show what a clown Kenny is!
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