In the global climate fight, 2015 could be the year for innovation, collaboration and partnership. We have already see this in operation with the energy and climate language associated with the nuclear trade and verification elements of President Barack Obama’s diplomatic trip to India, which drew to a close this week.
As he charts a path this year, let’s not forget that Obama legitimately helped rewrite the energy and environmental playing field in 2014. The United States Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan, introduced last year, requires power plant emissions nationwide to be cut by 30 percent by 2030, compared with 2005 levels. This in itself is important, and it helped open the door to a timely international dialogue.
While most nations were finalizing their announcements for the 20th Climate Conference of the Parties (COP) held in Lima in December, the U. S. and China were changing the rules of the conversation. At the 2014 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, the two countries eschewed the traditional divide between so-called developed and developing nations and instead sought common climate ground, setting the stage for both to change course and define the necessary paths to reduce their climate impact.
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