A speaker at the United Nations Climate Change Conference, also called COP29, in Baku, Azerbaijan, said Wednesday that extreme heat events should be named in order to combat climate change.
The summit, which began Monday, featured speakers proposing taxes on the meat and dairy industry and “climate finance” initiatives for less-developed countries. One speaker, ClimateWorks Foundation CEO Helen Mountford, described the need for “innovative approaches” to fight climate change. (RELATED: ‘We Are Not Learning’: Bjorn Lomborg Says Politicians Hide Behind Climate Change To Duck ‘Responsibility’ For ‘Failures’)
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“This summer, in response to the secretary general’s call for action on extreme heat, we put forward an initial $50 million to help support action in this area, and we will be looking to do more,” Mountford told a panel at the conference. “I want to offer three specific areas where I think we can really help move this agenda forward. One is just, as the U.N. system comes together to work together on this … to provide some of the research and data, support some of that, to provide — to fund pilots and evaluation of heat action plans in key countries to help support getting access to other funds, public and private, in those countries. So that’s one.”
“The second is really, given the urgency and the unprecedented nature of what we’re seeing on extreme heat, we need to be open to different and multiple different approaches here. We need to test, trial things quickly, learn from them, move on, take risks and be innovative,” Mountford said. “One example for it right now is naming extreme heat events, and I’m happy to continue supporting that.”
Natural disasters such as hurricanes and wildfires are commonly named for tracking purposes and streamlined reporting, however, the National Weather Service has claimed that weather patterns such as heat waves have historically not been named because they are, “highly contextual,” NPR reported earlier this year.
Multiple officials from the Biden administration — which notably backed away from a major emissions initiative at the event — including Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm, White House climate advisor John Podesta and Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, are attending the event in Azerbaijan. Podesta told attendees at the conference during a Monday speech that despite the election of former President Donald Trump, the United States would still be involved in addressing climate change, Bloomberg reported.
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