For decades, world leaders have pledged to reduce emissions, yet they continue to rise, says Richard Mountford. Plus letters from Harold Forbes, Martyn Thomas and John Gittings
For three decades, world leaders at international conferences have pledged to cut greenhouse gas emissions and greener energy sources have been developed, yet emissions have continued to rise (World still ‘on brink of climate catastrophe’ after Cop27 deal, 20 November). Even as previously extreme weather events become normal and millions of people are displaced by weather-related events, there is still no sign of electorates in richer countries being willing to vote for rationing or much higher prices for car use, air travel, meat consumption and other particularly damaging activities.
Clearly, we urgently need a new strategy. The world’s biggest economies or the UN need to spend hundreds of billions of dollars, perhaps funded by a financial transactions tax, on carbon scrubbing and ocean seeding to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere; solar radiation management to reduce warming; and the purchase and protection of land such as rainforest to prevent its destruction.
Richard Mountford
Hildenborough, Kent