France: Bombings Will Not Disrupt Climate Talks

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Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland)--France intends to push ahead with the United Nations (UN) Climate Conference in Paris at the end of this month despite the fatal terrorist attacks over the past week.

Although overshadowed by a series of terrorist bombings and shootings that claimed the lives of 129 people last weekend, the UN's COP21 summit in Paris, starting on November 30, will see 196 nations attempt to hammer out a binding global climate change agreement for the first time.

The French government has announced that the climate summit is still on, but promised a far higher level of security.

"It will go ahead with reinforced security measures," Laurent Fabius, French Foreign Minister, told reporters. "This is an absolutely necessary step in the battle against climate change, and of course it will take place."

"No head of state, of government...has asked us to postpone this meeting," said French Prime Minister Manuel Valls on radio station FTL. "All want to be there. To do otherwise would, I believe, be to yield to terrorism."

However, the scale of the event will be reduced, with side events cancelled. "We are in the process of looking at that, but everything which was outside of the climate talks, a whole series of concerts, of rather festive events, will without a doubt be cancelled," Valls said.

The goals of COP21 are to create a binding agreement through rules and mechanisms to keep global temperature within the 2-degrees Celsius limit. Nations will outline their contributions to climate change to date, and there will be financial support agreements for developing countries and for those transitioning towards low-carbon, resilient economies before and after 2020.

COP 21 will be watched closely by the world's energy industries, as the outcome will directly affect all sectors--from power generation and mining, to oil and gas production, automotive development and refining.

In recent weeks, many of the oil and gas industry's heavy hitters have promised more action on the climate front. Last month, Industrial Info reported that 10 of the world's biggest oil and gas companies, including BP plc (NYSE:BP) (London), Eni SpA (NYSE:E) (Rome, Italy), Royal Dutch Shell plc (NYSE:RDS.A) (The Hague, Netherlands) and Statoil ASA (NYSE:STO) (Stavangar, Norway), promised climate change action and support in advance of COP21. For additional information, see October 21, 2015, article - Big Oil Companies Promise Climate Change Action.

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