I love me a good Yvo de Boer profile as much as the next guy, and I applaud any effort to make the complexity of the UN climate negotiations bite-sized, but the first line of this AFP article is ridiculous, “Yvo de Boer, it could be argued, holds the fate of the planet in his hands.” Clearly I don’t disagree with the implicit message that the success of the UN climate negotiations will greatly impact the fate of our planet but rather that, thankfully, any one man holds that fate in his hands, even the Secretary General.
The sad fact for news peddlers is that these agreements will be built (and I believe they will) through the hard-fought efforts of hundreds, if not thousands, of individuals. On top of that, any workable solution will be amazingly complex and incrementally build. Case in point: check out this NY Times piece on the pre-negotiations currently being hashed out by China and the United States. Congressman Markey, cosponsor of a House energy bill that the article notes calls for 1/10th the reduction in GHGs that China is asking for, is quoted as saying, “This is going to be one of the most complex diplomatic negotiations in the history of the world.” True.