Wednesday, 2 December 2015

Australia will ratify second stage of Kyoto protocol, Malcolm Turnbull pledges

Extract from The Guardian

Observers say the formal ratification sends a positive signal at the start of the two week climate talks in Paris, but will make little practical difference

Lenore Taylor in Paris

@lenoretaylor

Malcolm Turnbull has pledged Australia will ratify the second stage of the Kyoto protocol – a move that underlines Australia’s change in attitude towards international climate talks but is unlikely to make any practical difference to reductions in emissions.
Experts said formal ratification of Kyoto 2 – which includes Australia’s minimum target to reduce emissions by 5% by 2020 that the government says it is already on track to meet – would have a limited real world impact.
But officials and long-term observers of the talks said the announcement sent a positive signal at the start of two weeks of talks in Paris that aim to clinch the next international climate deal, for reductions out to 2030. It was met with some applause from the conference floor.
In a day of promises designed, in the words of the French president, François Hollande, to give the conference “a drive and ambition commensurate to the challenge” Turnbull also joined at the last minute a US initiative to double public and private research and development spending on clean energy technology, which in Australia’s case means an additional $100m in government spending over five years.
And he announced that $1bn from Australia’s existing aid budget would be directed towards projects that reduce emissions or help countries adapt, including the $200m already committed by the Abbott government to the Green Climate Fund.
The environment minister, Greg Hunt, said ratifying Kyoto 2 sent a “very, very powerful symbol to the world” and also helped Australia meet its minimum 5% target by “carrying over” the amount by which it exceeded a very lenient target under the first Kyoto agreement.
Turnbull, speaking to the media after a sidelines meeting with Bill Gates, said he came to Paris “in a spirit of realistic optimism” and believed the meeting would result in a successful deal.
But he also said the government had no plans to increase its minimum 2020 target, even though it has inscribed tougher targets into the UN agreement under specific conditions that the independent Climate Change Authority says have been met.
Turnbull was also equivocal about whether he would have to increase the longer term Abbott government target for the agreement being negotiated in Paris – to reduce emissions by between 26% and 28% compared with 2005 levels by 2030, saying that would depend on the ambition of the global community.
Labor leader Bill Shorten, who is also in Paris, accused the government of coming with a message of hope but Tony Abbott’s old policies.
“Ratifying Kyoto 2 is fine as far as it goes ... but it’s not exactly setting the world on fire,” he said. Labor has promised to consider a reduction of 45% by 2030, based on 2005 levels.
He accused the government of “playing accounting games” by using existing aid funding for its $1bn climate financing promise.
Bill Hare, chief executive of Climate Analytics, said Australia’s promise to ratify Kyoto 2 was “largely incidental to this meeting, which is all about the next step after 2020”.
But the veteran observer of international climate talks said it would underline what negotiators had already noticed – “a quite noticeable change in attitude and demeanour from Australia” in international climate talks.
Erwin Jackson, the deputy chief executive of the Climate Institute, said the promise could have some tangible effects, including making it easier for Australian businesses to access international climate markets if Australia tightens the requirements of its Direct Action policy, and opening Australia to world pressure to move to the higher Kyoto 2 targets it had promised if other countries also acted – up to a 25% cut in emissions.
In his allotted speaking slot Turnbull delivered an international version of his domestic message of optimism and faith in innovation and technological advances.
“From Australia we come with confidence and optimism,” he said, adding that Australia was confident the conference would “secure our future” because of our “great optimism and faith in humanity’s genius for invention”.
World leaders brought both specific promises and persuasive rhetoric to the day of speed-speeches in two simultaneous sessions – with leaders’ attendance scheduled at the start of the conference to “turbocharge” talks, rather than at the end, as it was in the disastrous Copenhagen meeting in 2009.
The recent Paris terrorist attacks were used by many as a rallying point – with the US president, Barack Obama, saying the meeting was an “act of defiance” and the attendance of so many leaders a “rejection of those who would tear down our world”.
Obama cited his new research and development initiative – “Mission Innovation” –and foreshadowed a new spending promise for least developed nations including low-lying Pacific Islands.
He told the meeting it could be the “turning point” in the world’s response to a threat that “could define the contours of this century more than any other”.

Barack Obama: parts of Paris climate deal must carry legal force

Extract from The Guardian

US president eases one obstacle to a successful outcome in apparent compromise over the periodic review of emission reduction targets

President Barack Obama holds a news conference at the conclusion of his visit to the Paris climate talks. Photograph: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

Suzanne Goldenberg

@suzyji

Barack Obama declared on Tuesday that some components to a global climate change agreement must carry legal force, easing one obstacle to a successful outcome at negotiations in Paris.
In an apparent compromise, Obama said the US would push for certain aspects of a climate change agreement to be legally binding – going some distance to meeting a key demand of the European Union and some developing countries.
However, Obama offered no change in the US position on the overall nature of the agreement sought at Paris.
The US has been clear from the outset that it will not sign on to a fully fledged climate change treaty because it would have virtually no chance of passage through a Republican-controlled Congress.
The US has also insisted that countries come up with their own targets for cutting emissions – and that these remain entirely voluntary.
On Tuesday, however, Obama said the US wanted one major component of the deal – the periodic review of emissions reductions targets – to be legally binding.
Such reviews are deemed necessary if countries are to achieve their agreed goal of limiting warming to 2C.
The pledges so far would at best hold warming to 2.7C – which would still unleash catastrophic climate impacts on low-lying islands and poor countries.
“Although the targets themselves may not have the force of treaties, the process, the procedures that ensure transparency and periodic reviews, that needs to be legally binding. And that’s going to be critical in us having high ambitions and holding each other accountable,” Obama told reporters in Paris.
The US had earlier proposed a hybrid formula of a climate change agreement with some legally enforceable elements to try to overcome divisions about the nature of the climate change agreement being negotiated in Paris. The European Union and developing countries have pushed for a legally binding agreement, such as the Kyoto protocol.
However, the US argues a legal treaty would be a no-go because of its domestic political circumstances. Congress failed to ratify the Kyoto protocol in the 1990s, and George W Bush eventually repudiated the agreement.
Republicans in Congress have stepped up their rhetoric against what they called Obama’s “suspect climate agenda”.
Lamar Smith, the chair of the house science, space and technology committee, told a hearing Obama and US government scientific agencies were misleading the American public and overstating the dangers of climate change. He also accused Obama of improperly avoiding congressional oversight of his policies.
“The American people should be suspicious of this administration when it continually impedes congressional oversight of its extreme climate agenda,” Smith said.
Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, also lashed out at Obama. “The president simply went around Congress to impose similarly regressive – and likely illegal – ‘power plan’ energy regulations anyway,” McConnell told reporters on Monday. “He’s currently trying to sell that power plan to world leaders in Paris as proof of the American government’s commitment to his energy priorities.”
Obama’s statement in Paris came as the House science, space and technology committee heard from the controversial Danish economist, Bjorn Lomborg, who claimed that a climate deal at Paris would reduce warming by only fractions of a degree and would cost close to $2tn a year by 2030.
His conclusions run counter to those of most economists and major international financial institutions such as the World Bank.
Campaign groups meanwhile welcomed Obama’s remarks, especially his optimism that the international community would succeed in meeting its climate goals through technological advances in green energy.
“It’s good to see the president support a long-term goal, but calling for the global economy to become low carbon over the course of the century falls short of what we need,” said Kumi Naidoo, director of Greenpeace. “To remain credible, he needs to support the vulnerable countries who have just called for all energy to be renewable energy by 2050.”
According to a New York Times/CBS News poll published on Monday 63% of Americans support the US signing up to a binding international agreement to curb the growth in carbon emissions.
But a majority of Republicans in Congress deny the existence of climate change or oppose action on it. In the run-up to Paris, and while Obama has been at the summit, Republicans in Congress have repeatedly threatened to block climate aid to developing countries.
Obama at his press conference on Tuesday dismissed such threats, saying the funds were already in the process of being allocated.
He also said that his climate legacy would survive after he leaves the White House at the end of his presidency next year. “Whoever is the next president of the United States if they come in and they suggest somehow that that global consensus – not just 99.5% of scientists and experts but 99.5% of world leaders – think this is really important I think the president of the United States is going to think this is really important.”
Obama spoke only hours before the House of Representatives was due to vote to repeal the rules cutting carbon emissions from power plants that are the linchpin of the president’s climate plan. The White House has said it will veto any measure blocking the power plant rules, and Congress does not have the votes to overcome a veto. The Senate has already voted to repeal the climate rules.
The hybrid nature of a deal is critical to US thinking about how to counter domestic political pressure against signing on to a global climate deal.
With that in mind, the Obama administration moved years ago to circumvent Congress by pressing for an agreement that would fall short of a legal treaty.
The strategy mirrors Obama’s efforts on the domestic political front, where – facing a wall of opposition in Congress – he has used his existing authority to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
The US was a major force behind the thinking underpinning the deal being negotiated in Paris, of a cut-what-you-can strategy, where countries volunteer their own emissions reductions targets.
So far, more than 180 countries have come out with climate plans ahead of the Paris meeting, which the US claims as a vindication of the voluntary strategy.

Paris climate talks: the real test is whether countries will keep their word

Extract from The Guardian

The emissions pledges are in and the world’s leaders are in town – but there is a risk that progress will be smothered by old sticking points

World leaders meet at COP21 in Paris. The stakes are high and the bar has been set low for what can be called a success. Photograph: Xinhua/Landov/Barcroft Media

Lenore Taylor in Paris

@lenoretaylor

At the Copenhagen climate summit in 2009 world leaders arrived at the end and could not save it from failure. In Paris, 150 leaders came at the beginning and were confident of success.
That is partly because the negotiators have reset what qualifies as a success – and not just to allow the leaders to pat themselves on the back. They decided that, counter-intuitively, they might achieve more by demanding less. But the new plan comes with a risk.
For more than 20 years, the world has been struggling to tackle climate change, worried about the cost of acting but always knowing it would cost unthinkably more to leave the problem unattended.
Now – in a deal to decide how far emissions are cut until 2030 – rather than horse-trading during the negotiations over what carbon cuts each country will offer, countries were allowed to pledge what they feel is a reasonable contribution to the accepted goal of limiting global warming to 2C.
Those pledges are in. That in itself is a remarkable achievement and the job of the leaders in Paris was to give some momentum to the negotiations on the deal that will surround them.
Leader after leader took to that task with passion in two simultaneous sessions on Monday that continued into the night to fit them all in.The US president, Barack Obama, came with a message of hope and urgency, saying climate change would “define the contours of this century more dramatically than any other”. The Chinese president, Xi Jinping, set out the big steps his country had taken since its intransigent stance in 2009. Canada’s new premier, Justin Trudeau, declared that his country was “back”, in clear contrast to the less helpful attitude of his predecessor Stephen Harper.
The leaders of small island states pleaded, as they always do, for the world to think about what it felt like to face inundation. The Paris attacks were used as a rallying point. “Through our presence here today we show we are stronger than the terrorists,” the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, declared. Global leaders delivered the familiar warnings. “A political moment like this may not come again,” said the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon.
But even though the mood was optimistic and the words were full of purpose, the attention of the 40,000 assembled officials and media drifted a bit when each leader got down to the details of exactly what their country was actually doing – even at the beginning when there were still plenty of them watching. And that’s the danger.
The pledges made so far will still result in global warming of at least 2.7 degrees, even if they are all met – much better than the 5C rise we might expect without action but still short of the 2C goal. Experience suggests there is a very big “if”, and negotiators have virtually given up on the idea that the pledges should be legally binding. Shirkers will face no real sanction, other than international opprobrium. And that means a system to check and report what each country does is critical.
But the rules for monitoring remain unfinished. The plans to regularly review and ratchet up the pledges to contain global warming to 2C or lower are not finalised either and will be critical. Developing countries argue they still need more finance. Those details matter.
Once the leaders are on their jets back home, sorting out the details will be the job of the same negotiators who have been talking about them for the past 21 years at scores and scores of these conferences.
The same things will divide. The developed world will demand verifiable commitments from developing countries like China, India and Brazil – who over decades of talking have become, or are becoming, the world’s major emitters. And the developing world will demand money to help deal with the climate crisis.
A weak agreement could still be hailed a success in two weeks’ time because the bar has been lowered and much of the work has already been done. But the real measure of success will be whether countries stick to and strengthen their commitments.
Only then will any deal match all the leaders’ first day rhetoric about really doing something this time.

Future tense for Turnbull as Brough and Abbott recall Coalition's imperfect past

Extract from The Guardian

The PM arrives home to all the ingredients for bloodletting on a historic scale amid Tony Abbott’s fresh attack on Julie Bishop and the Mal Brough saga.

Malcolm Turnbull will return from the Paris climate talks to some tough decisions on how to handle the Mal Brough furore and Tony Abbott’s criticism of Julie Bishop. Photograph: David Gray/Reuters

Katharine Murphy Deputy political editor

@murpharoo

Malcolm Turnbull is flying home from Paris overnight. When he arrives in Canberra at dawn on Wednesday, he’ll step back into domestic political reality. That reality is looking rather frayed around the edges.
The big question after any leadership change is always whether or not the various protagonists can control themselves.
Labor proved comprehensively during the Kevin/Julia saga that internecine personality conflict was actually more important than being in government.
The rank self-indulgence of that collective judgment seems incomprehensible, but there it was. We all saw it. It’s hard to expunge it from the memory bank.
Now, 11 weeks on from the change in the Liberal leadership, it’s becoming the Coalition’s turn to decide whether staging a gory revenge tragedy is more important than being in government.
Turnbull is riding high in the opinion polls, but in the toxic little half-deranged world that is Australian politics, the new prime minister has Tony Abbott rampaging around like a wounded bull, defending his legacy, obsessively taking traitors to task.
Abbott has in an interview with Fairfax unleashed a fresh tirade about Julie Bishop, accusing her of peddling falsehoods about the events leading up to Turnbull’s ascension.
Turnbull also has conservatives spoiling for odd little proxy fights on the breadth of the government’s climate change commitments or how we talk about violent extremism.
Why? Just because.
There’s been so much combat in Australian politics in recent times the whole super structure actually seems profoundly disconcerted by the prospect of peace.
Animus, once unleashed, can be very hard to contain. Everybody seems to need the last word.
Adding to the basket of welcome-home presents, Turnbull will have to make a call about his special minister of state, Mal Brough.
Turnbull can’t ultimately control Abbott and the rusted-on haters – unless Abbott ultimately wants to sue for peace. A grand bargain between the two combatants is, actually, possible, but on current indications, fraught, particularly while both are so fully intent on their respective product differentiation.
But Brough is all Turnbull’s doing, and entirely within his control.
The special minister of state is in the ministry now not because of his soaring political talents but because he helped Turnbull blast Abbott out of the prime ministerial suite.
We are now in the second week of Labor’s persistent and forensic questioning of Brough about his conduct during the James Ashby/Peter Slipper affair – which serves to remind the public that the minister Turnbull appointed to a portfolio safeguarding the integrity of the parliament is facing an Australian federal police investigation.
Tuesday wasn’t a great day for Brough.
In attempting to fortify his defences, he bought himself a fight with the 60 Minutes program, and in the process, opened himself to fresh arguments that he had misled the parliament.
Courtesy of some fresh Ashby reflections in the Australian, curious eyes also drifted in the direction of another Turnbull loyalist – fellow Queenslander Wyatt Roy.
Federal parliament sits for two more days before Turnbull attempts to launch himself into summer with an innovation statement and the release of the new economic forecasts.
This Brough choice is squarely on the prime minister.
These are supposed to be exciting and realistically optimistic times, after all.
Best mind the clutter.

Tuesday, 1 December 2015

Bill Shorten calls for ambitious targets as COP21 climate talks get underway in Paris

Extract from ABC News

Lateline

By Brigid Andersen

Updated about 6 hours ago

External Link: Shorten speaks to Lateline

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten has called for ambitious climate targets to be set as world leaders gather in Paris for the United Nations Climate Conference.

Mr Shorten spoke to Lateline from Paris as the talks got underway and said nations that did not take strong action would be increasingly isolated.

"The whole reason for this Paris conference is because climate change is having worse and worse effects on our environment and even more importantly, on our economy," he said.

"So nations who think that they don't need to change, I think will get isolated in the future in trade and other arrangements between nations."

French president Francois Hollande officially opened the summit by telling world leaders that the "hope of all of humanity rests on your shoulders".

Mr Shorten said he would be attending a number of meetings while he was in Paris.

"I will be meeting with hopefully leaders from the Pacific Island nations. They really do count on Australia as being a big brother in the best sense of the word for standing up for their concerns," he said.

"I'm looking forward to talking with businesses. There's a lot of private sector interest in the decisions that will be made at Paris, and the decisions that nations make.

"See, if a nation like Australia sets ambitious goals, what will happen is that we can then encourage the private sector to step in and help deliver the solutions from technology to trade opportunities to investment in renewable energy."

Shorten says 'Turnbull playing in traffic'

Last week Mr Shorten announced Labor's new climate policy with an emissions reduction target of 45 per cent on 2005 levels by 2030.

He rejected suggestions a carbon price under the proposal could be as high as $200 a tonne.

"It's just complete rubbish," he said.

He said the climate change debate had been one of the more toxic issues in politics and that it would have been easy for Labor to just give bipartisan support to the Government's "ridiculously low targets".

"Malcolm Turnbull's caught. He's caught in the middle of the road on this. He's playing in the traffic," he said.

"On one hand he had to in order to become the leader of the Liberal Party, sign up to Tony Abbott's climate change policies, with their ridiculously low targets. On the other hand he should at least be honest with people and admit the consequences of change."

He said the cost of not acting on climate change was too high.

"The truth of the matter is that if sea levels rise, property will become, and infrastructure in Australia will become a lot more costly," he said.

"We'll have more drought. We'll have more extreme weather events. So there's a big cost in not acting."

Bill Shorten, Subjects: Paris summit; Labor’s climate plan; Visit to Australian Defence Personnel in the Middle East

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

RADIO INTERVIEW
RN BREAKFAST
MONDAY, 30 NOVEMBER 2015

ALISON CARABINE: Bill Shorten, welcome to Breakfast.

BILL SHORTEN, LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION: Good morning Al.

CARABINE: The Prime Minister says he’ll be seeking a strong and durable outcome at the summit, there does seem to be some degree of optimism that an agreement of sorts can be reached – does it look to you like Paris will be more successful than Copenhagen?
SHORTEN: I think Paris will be more successful than Copenhagen, because the world has now seen another five years of the consequences of climate change. I think the world’s recognised that it cannot afford to keep ignoring the problem of climate change, and we need to work together to help improve the future for our environmental circumstances.
CARABINE: You’ve been very critical of the climate targets that Malcolm Turnbull is taking to Paris, 26 to 28 per cent reduction by 2030, you say he’s a sell-out. But it looks as though the Prime Minister will be prepared to lift those targets when they’re reviewed in two years’ time. As the Prime Minister says, Paris isn’t the end game, it’s just another step on the way to achieving net zero emissions. Isn’t an increase in our targets more likely to happen under Malcolm Turnbull than it ever was under Tony Abbott.
SHORTEN: Well if we assume that anyone does more than Tony Abbott that’s a good thing, well then you’re right. But the truth of the matter is, Malcolm Turnbull and I are both in Paris, but the person who’s running Australia’s climate change policy is Tony Abbott. Malcolm Turnbull sold out his views on climate change in order to secure the votes from the right-wing base of the Liberal Party. What do you say about an Australian leader who although he knows that climate change is real is pushing Tony Abbott’s policies. To be fair to Tony Abbott, he didn’t get climate change, he was a climate sceptic, he was a denialist, and the policies which he put in place reflected Tony Abbott’s backward mindset. But what’s Malcolm Turnbull’s excuse? He gets climate change.
CARABINE: But Malcolm Turnbull isn’t necessarily looking for excuses if indeed Australia’s targets are reviewed in just two years’ time.

SHORTEN: Well Malcolm Turnbull is, let’s face it. Why would he be critical of Labor, and then he starts dropping out lines saying that well he thinks we can have higher targets? Like, what is Malcolm Turnbull on climate change? Is he the man who wants to be Prime Minister, or is he the man who wants to act on climate change? Because he can’t be both at the moment.

CARABINE: Bill Shorten you’ve taken this goal of a 45 per cent reduction in carbon emissions by 2030 with you to Paris, and the Prime Minister said over the weekend it’s ‘heroic’ and more of a political statement than an environmental one. Would you have announced such a headline grabbing greenhouse goal if Labor wasn’t trailing so badly in the opinion polls?

SHORTEN: No, well last year when Tony Abbott was in charge, Labor said that we wanted to have an emissions trading scheme. We’ve been very fair dinkum on climate change. We’ve been very fair dinkum. I haven’t changed the fashion of what I think based upon politics, I just base it upon the science. This figure of 45 per cent reduction by 2030, 45 per cent reduction off our 2005 levels of carbon pollution, we will consult with industry about it. We’re doing the work the Government was too lazy or too disinclined to do.

CARABINE: And will you model the impact on household budgets of a greenhouse goal almost twice the size of the Government’s before you lock in a 45 per cent reduction by 2030?

SHORTEN: Oh I love this discussion about you know, the scare campaign being run by the right-wing of the Liberal Party and some elements of the media. We have proposed mechanisms to reduce our carbon emissions levels – they include looking at vehicle standards, building standards, looking at an emissions trading system with international linkages, and a really strong focus on renewable energy. Malcolm Turnbull should at least have the honesty to talk about the consequences of climate change. I thought it was ironic that he was lecturing the rest of the Commonwealth at the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Malta about the need to act on climate change, yet when it comes to action, our policies by the current Liberal Government led by Malcolm Turnbull put as at the back of the pack.
CARABINE: Investing in new technologies would help Labor reaches its longer term ambition of net zero emissions by 2050, do you therefore welcome the Prime Minister’s comments that he wants innovation and green technologies to play a big role in Paris. Is that heading in the right direction?
SHORTEN: Of course it is. But it’s not as if Malcolm Turnbull’s invested the tesla battery. Let’s be straight here again, you need to have targets and goals of what you have before you’re going.
CARABINE Bill Shorten on your way to Paris you stopped off in the Middle East where you met Australian Defence Personnel, you were also briefed on our military operations, did you get a sense that Islamic State is being hauled and contained in Syria and Iraq?
SHORTEN: I had the privilege of visiting some of our Australian Defence Personnel who are working on the mission to stop Islamic State spreading its evil influence in Iraq and parts of Syria. Our people, in the Australian Defence Force are highly professional and are punching above their weight in contributing to the mission. Two – I think that our military operations as part of a broader coalition are forcing the terrorist to change their patterns and the way that their trying to disrupt Iraq. So I think it is having some military success. But thirdly what I am also very clear on is that air power alone or military intervention alone isn’t going to deliver lasting peace in the region. We need to see a peaceful solution owned by the people and the region and the governments of the region in the Middle East where we are operating, nothing else is going to achieve the long term goals of peace and security.
CARABINE And will peace and security only be achieved long term if there are ground forces deployed to Iraq and Syria?
SHORTEN: No, I do not believe that we should be extending a large, sort of, military expeditionary force into Syria. In terms of Iraq, the Iraqi Government has got a – their the people who’ve invited us to do what we’re doing and I see no signs of the Iraqi Government wants to invite further military escalation in terms of formed up combat troops fighting with ISIL and Iraq. I think the Iraqi Government is very happy with the contribution that’s been made by coalition forces and I’m sure that they’ve very satisfied with the support that Australia is giving them in the support that we are giving them in their current form without expanding our military intervention in the manor which your question asked.
CARABINE: Bill Shorten thank you for your time.
SHORTEN: Thanks very much. Have a lovely day.

ENDS

Obama calls Paris climate talks an 'act of defiance' in wake of recent attacks

Extract from The Guardian

US president salutes French people for going ahead with crucial climate talks in his address to heads of state on first day of the conference.

Fiona Harvey in Paris

Monday 30 November 2015 23.13 AEDT

Barack Obama has told crucial UN climate talks in Paris that the negotiations represent an “act of defiance” after the barbaric attacks in the city two weeks ago in which 130 people were killed.

Offering his condolences and pledging solidarity with the people of “this beautiful city” he said, “We have come to Paris to show our resolve ... to protect our people, and to uphold the enduring values that keep us strong and keep us free. We salute the people of Paris for insisting this crucial conference go on.”

150 heads of state and government are attending the first day of the two-week talks, instructing their negotiating teams on coming to a deal.

The Paris talks are seen as a last chance for coordinated global action on climate change under the UN. If these talks fail to produce an agreement, the world will be left without an international effort to prevent dangerous levels of global warming.

Current international commitments on curbing emissions, from developed and developing countries, run out in 2020, and the following decade will be crucial in deciding whether dangerous climate change takes hold, as infrastructure like power stations and transport links built in the next 15 years will still be used for half a century to come. If it is not built to low-carbon standards, and current emissions are not curbed, the world is in danger of temperature rises of up to 5C – levels that would cause dramatic changes in weather and ravage huge swathes of the globe.

Obama said that the attendance of world leaders was a “rejection of those who would tear down our world”, and drew parallels between the ravages of climate change and terrorism. “[We want] a declaration that, for all the challenges we face, climate change could define the contours of this century more dramatically than any other.”

He warned of some of the likely effects of climate change: “Submerged countries; abandoned cities; fields that no longer grow; political disruptions that trigger new conflict; and even more floods of desperate peoples seeking sanctuary in nations not their own.”

The Paris conference could change that, he said: “This future is one that we have the power to change – right here, right now.”

“One of the enemies we will be fighting at this conference is cynicism – the notion that we can’t do anything about climate change,” he added.

Poor nations must receive particular help, he urged. “We must reaffirm our commitment that the resources will be there [in financial assistance for the developing world]. We must make sure these resources [of climate finance] fall to countries that need help … and help vulnerable populations rebuild stronger after climate related disasters.”

A cause for hope, he said, was that a sense of urgency was growing among nations, as well as an increasing realisation that it is within our power to tackle climate change.

Obama said the US embraced its responsibility – as the world’s largest economy and second largest emitter – to act, and called for unity among world leaders attending the talks. He urged a “common purpose [for a] world that is not marked not by conflict but by cooperation – not by human suffering but human progress.”

“Let’s get to work,” he concluded.

However, although world leaders were anxious to stress their solidarity with Paris and their support for the UN negotiations, tensions were also clearly visible. Vladimir Putin of Russia and Obama barely made eye contact on meeting, and in a private meeting with Obama, the Indian president Narendra Modi is understood to have made it clear he thinks developed countries should take on substantial carbon cuts while allowing poor nations to increase their emissions.

While pledging India to protect the planet, and announcing new initiatives on solar power, Modi was adamant: “Climate change is not of our making. It is the result of global warming that came from an industrial age powered by fossil fuel.”

Speaking shortly after Obama, China’s president Xi Jinping said the eyes of the world were on Paris and that, “tackling climate change is a shared mission for all mankind.” He reiterated the country’s pledge to peak its emissions by 2030 and said: “we have confidence and resolve to fulfil our commitments”.

Pointedly, he also insisted that developing countries must not be prevented from growing their economies by having to deal with emissions and the impacts of warming: “Addressing climate change should not deny the legitimate needs of developing countries to reduce poverty.”

A crucial issue at the talks will be how to provide financial assistance to the poorest countries, to help them cut their emissions and deal with the effects of climate change. Another will be a long-term pledge not to let global temperatures rise beyond the widely agreed danger threshold of 2C, beyond which scientists say climate change will become catastrophic and irreversible. But a number of poor nations, endorsed by the UN’s climate chief, have made it clear they want a lower limit, of 1.5C, to protect small islands from swamping and the poorest nations from extreme weather. That debate has been left open by the French presidency.

Ban Ki-moon, UN secretary general, urged countries to come to a deal: ”Please, let’s meet on the middle ground, show some flexibility and sense of compromise for the common good. We can’t go on like this. We can’t waste any further time.”

President François Holland told the assembled leaders and delegates at the opening ceremony that France had put all of its energies into reaching an agreement in Paris. “Your presence here is a sign of hope,” he told world leaders.

Laurent Fabius, the French foreign minister who is hosting the talks as COP president, said: “COP21 needs to be a tipping point, a turning point. The Paris conference will no doubt not resolve everything, but nothing can be resolved without it. It is France’s responsibility to help address two of the greatest challenges of the century: combating terrorism and fighting climate change. Today’s generations are calling upon us to act, while tomorrow’s generations will judge our action. We cannot hear them yet, but in a way they are already watching us.”

David Cameron, the UK prime minister, also urged action. He stood alongside Prince Charles for the opening ceremony, as all of the leaders posed for a “family” photograph.

Leaders spent most of the day making speeches, leaving their supporting teams anxious in some cases that the timetable for private meetings – the core reason for the leaders’ presence, to iron out remaining differences and create an atmosphere of diplomatic cooperation in which a deal can be brokered – would be squeezed. However, many expected to work long into the night, while negotiators carried on their meetings on a draft text of an agreement behind closed doors.

Additional reporting by Arthur Neslen