Global carbon budget gives all a clear and simple target

Two CEO members of the South African Corporate Leaders Group on Climate Change (SA CLG), Mike Brown of Nedbank and Mark Cutifani of AngloGold Ashanti, have contributed a substantial op-ed article to today’s Business Day, in which they set out to clarify what South African business leaders need to understand about the carbon emissions reduction challenge.

The SA CLG is convened by Cambridge Programme for Sustainability Leadership and is part of a network of 15 similar groups around the wolrd, collectively known as the Corporate Leaders Network for Climate Action.

The 2°C Challenge Communiqué

The 2°C Challenge Communiqué calls on governments to break the deadlock in the international negotiations and take the necessary action at a national level to ensure a successful transition to green growth and a climate resilient economy.

Starting with the negotiations in Bali in 2007, previous Communiqués quickly gained wide business and NGO support, with 950 companies endorsing its message of support for an “ambitious, robust and equitable global deal on climate change” before the UN climate conference in Copenhagen in 2009. This year, business leaders emphasise that the window of opportunity to stabilise warming to 2°C “has almost closed”.

The Communiqué notes that, if they fail to act, governments “risk permanent damage to their credibility”, but the right action would “secure a low carbon-emission economy that is more resilient, more efficient and less vulnerable to global shock”. Without an international deal, “business will have insufficient clarity or certainty of action to invest to its full potential”.

Who produced The Communiqué?

The Communiqué has been written and delivered by business leaders from a range of sectors including energy, finance, mining, retail, and manufacturing, via the newly established Corporate Leaders Network for Climate Action (CLN). The CLN includes groups from Central and South America, Europe, Africa, Asia and the US.

We encourage all CEOs to sign up.

Event: A climate science update ahead of COP 17

CAMBRIDGE RESILIENCE FORUM
sponsored by Webber Wentzel

PRESENTS

Dr Emily Shuckburgh:
A climate science update ahead of COP 17

DATE: Wednesday 28 September 2011
TIME: 17:00 for 17:30 – 19:00
VENUE: Webber Wentzel Cape Town Office, 15th Floor Convention Tower, Heerengracht, Foreshore

Cambridge Programme for Sustainability Leadership in partnership with Webber Wentzel invites you to a presentation by Dr Emily Shuckburgh who heads the Open Oceans research group at the British Antarctic Survey.

The 17th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 17) is taking place in Durban at the end of the year. While the international negotiations to allocate the available global carbon budget has progressed slowly over the last few years, the scientific research into the evidence of climate change and the expected impacts is continuing.

Understanding past and future climate shifts requires robust and fine-grained modelling and measurement. Antartica is an important focal point for much climate research and the British Antarctic Survey is one of the leading institutes conducting this work.

Entrance is free but numbers are limited, booking is essential.

To confirm your attendance please e-mail Elspeth Donovan on elspeth.donovan@cpsl.cam.ac.uk

More details on the speaker:

Dr Emily Shuckburgh leads the Open Oceans research group at the British Antarctic Survey, which is focused on understanding the role of the polar oceans in the global climate system. She is also a fellow of Darwin College, Cambridge. She is a climate scientist who has worked at Ecole Normal Superieure in Paris and at MIT, as well as at the University of Cambridge.

Her personal research concerns atmosphere and ocean dynamics and she is currently focusing her efforts on understanding the circulation of the Southern Ocean around Antarctica. At the University of Cambridge she lectures a course on climate change in the Dept of Earth Sciences and is a faculty member of the Climate Leadership Programme.

At present she is undertaking a part-time secondment to the UK Government’s Department of Energy and Climate Change. She is a fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society and presently chair of their scientific publications committee.