FOCUS ON – ENERGY & UTILITIES
"A REASONABLE STEP FORWARD, 6/10" - ETC'S ADAIR TURNER TALKS COP26 In mid-November, all eyes were on Glasgow which was hosting the global climate summit COP26. As the politicians, business leaders and protestors alike were heading to Scotland, the conference was being billed as the follow-up to the Paris Agreement and even heralded as “humanity’s last chance to save the environment”. A few days later, it ended with the summit’s president Alok Sharma on the verge of tears and a distinctly anti-climactic feeling to the whole thing.
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hortly after, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres released a statement that seemed to sum up the general underwhelmed sentiment, describing the approved texts as a “compromise that reflects the interests, the conditions, the contradictions and the state of political will in the world today.” It was a pragmatist’s assessment. Remove the diplomatic gloss and what he really meant was “it was the best we could manage right now”.
