Ban Ki-moon calls for UN action on climate change

Moving the climate change debate, which has settled down into a consensus on AWG, out of the scientific body advising the UN — the IPCC — and into the General Assembly seems like a good idea.

Even better, Ban seems to expect results coming out of his attempt to bang heads together:

He said that the outcomes from this meeting would feed into the UN climate negotiation process.

"I have been advised by many experts that if we act now - since we have the resources and heightened awareness - we can reverse it," he said.

"Then we can give a much more prosperous planet Earth to our great, great, grandchildren. "

clipped from news.bbc.co.uk The international climate debate needs to embrace a "new way of thinking" to tackle the problem, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has urged. He called for both industrialised and developing nations to focus on limiting future global greenhouse gas emissions. Mr Ban added that he would convene a climate summit to help reach consensus on a global climate action plan. The idea of making developing nations enforce emissions caps has also faced opposition. Recent attempts to reach a global agreement to replace the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012, have ended in failure. The global climate treaty requires industrialised nations to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 5.2% from 1990 levels, but the US and Australia have refused to ratify it. "To build on the current momentum, I am going to convene a high-level UN General Assembly debate on 24 September." "Business as usual is no longer an option - we must reach complete agreement," he told the audience in central London.