(GERMANY)
City and regional leaders at today’s session of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP23) have agreed to accelerate efforts to deliver on the Paris Agreement.
On the day Al Gore proclaimed at COP23, in Bonn, “we are now in the early stages of a global sustainability revolution”, international decision-makers from local government signed the Bonn-Fiji Commitment pledging to make specific progress on UN Sustainable Development Goal 11, to make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. Harnessing renewable energies will be a key element of this initiative.
Dr Joan Clos, Executive Director of UN-Habitat, said: “Cities can play a greater role in renewable energy generation sector, not only as advocates and mobilizers but as energy generators, now that the capital investment and prize for renewable energy is affordable for cities in comparison with the past. Cities can become carbon neutral in municipal energy requirements, like public lighting, public transport, sewage and waste management.”
