PARIS (December 9, 2015)—Below is a statement by Alden Meyer, director of strategy and policy at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS).
"It's encouraging to see a cleaner text that contains fewer brackets as a result of agreements being reached on issues like technology development and transfer and capacity building. However, the agreements on the core political issues—the long-term goal, review and revision of proposed national contributions, transparency, loss and damage, and finance—have yet to be resolved.
"We're now at the critical point of the negotiations. Over the next day or two, ministers need to rise above their differences to create a final agreement that rapidly transitions the world to a clean energy economy and allows us to avoid the worst impacts of climate change."