: Countries Brought Big Promises to COP26. Cities Brought Actions #WorldNEWS Endless speeches. Vague pledges for decades in the future. Vast sums of money “unlocked”—but not directly

Countries Brought Big Promises to COP26. Cities Brought Actions #WorldNEWS
Endless speeches. Vague pledges for decades in the future. Vast sums of money “unlocked”—but not directly invested—by governments. For anyone following the events at COP26, the abstractness of it all could be enough to make them feel lightheaded.
For a more concrete picture of the transformations that need to take place in the short term, it helps to look to cities. Although city mayors don’t have a formal role in the U. N. negotiations, at least a dozen of them came to Glasgow anyway, armed with emissions-cutting projects already underway, and goals for the next few years.
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Oslo brought its climate budget, which, by forcing local legislators to prove spending is in line with emissions targets, has put the city on track to cut emissions by 50% in 2022 compared to 1990 levels. Paris, Bogota and London came with unprecedented programs—expanded during the pandemic—to take cars of their streets. Others who couldn’t make it to Glasgow have also shared concrete steps: four South African cities are rolling out the continent’s first zero-carbon building code, which will prevent millions of tons of emissions in the next few years. Seoul is in the process of installing 1 GW of solar energy capacity by 2022.
“The single fastest way that national governments can make good on the promises theyve made here at COP in the next few years is to devolve more power to city governments,” says Mark Watts, director of the C40 climate leadership group of 97 cities, sitting in a glass-walled hotel restaurant near the COP26 site. “Among political leaders, theres no one thats more science based in the action and the commitments. ”
In 2016, the C40 cities committed to limit global average temperature rise to 1. 5°C over preindustrial-era levels. Though public support for that goal has never been more obvious, with massive youth-led demonstrations worldwide, national governments are still debating it at COP26.
“Governments that are closest to the people are best able to be responsive,” Austin mayor Steve Adler told TIME on Tuesday evening over the phone from Edinburgh, where he was spending the night before heading to Glasgow. Our community is concerned about climate change and willing to really put our shoulder to our responsibilities. The national government is being pulled in lots of different ways.
Adler is in Scotland primarily to tout a transit scheme, partly funded by a property tax hike approved by voters last year, that will add light rail and electric buses to car-centric Austin. The city is also bounding ahead of others in the transition to clean energy.

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