Emissions Cuts, Adaptation Money Desperately Needed in Face of Accelerating Climate Change
 

WASHINGTON (November 26, 2012) – Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) today called on the U.S. delegation to the climate talks in Doha, Qatar to take the strongest possible position on cutting the carbon emissions that are driving climate change, and to work on creating a funding stream for adaptation measures. Rep. Markey noted that in the wake of Superstorm Sandy as part of a record-breaking two years of extreme weather, the international community, but especially the United States, bears a responsibility to prevent the worst effects of global warming, and prepare for the changes that are already occurring.
 
Rep. Markey (D-Mass.) is the co-author of the Waxman-Markey climate change bill that passed the House in 2009 and provided both the U.S. delegation with its climate targets for the Copehangen negotiations of that year, and also raised money from polluters for adaptation and technology measures for developing nations.
 
“American negotiators at these climate talks must heed the warnings from Sandy and other extreme weather supercharged by climate change,” said Rep. Markey. “If the United States does not aggressively pursue sharp reductions in carbon pollution following the droughts, storms and other extreme weather events we have endured, the rest of the world will doubt our sincerity to address climate change. It’s time to attack the carbon problem head on, and adapt to a climate already changed for the worse.”
 
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