Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

COP21: Green MP Caroline Lucas hails climate change agreement saying it will speed up switch to renewables

The politican said the agreement paved the way towards renewable energy becoming 'totally competitive' with fossil fuels

Caroline Mortimer
Saturday 12 December 2015 11:50 GMT
Comments
Green MP Caroline Lucas
Green MP Caroline Lucas

The UK’s only Green Party MP, Caroline Lucas, has said she hopes the new climate change agreement will mean countries will make the switch to renewable energy faster.

Delegates from over 190 countries have produced a draft agreement to cut fuel emissions - the details of which are due to be announced in a press conference on Saturday morning.

Ministers finally came to an agreement at around 6:45am local time (5:45am GMT) which is believed to include the pledge to reduce temperature rises to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.

This more strident than previous UN pledges to limit it by 2C - and far lower than the projected 2.7C rise by 2100.

Speaking to the BBC, Ms Lucas said: “Renewables are already massively coming down in price and within a very few years solar energy, for example, will be totally competitive with fossil fuels, indeed will probably be cheaper than fossil fuels.

“So this will accelerate the transition which is already happening and which is already going to ultimately save us money.”

No details of the agreement have emerged so far but tensions between countries began to flare as the talks went beyond the official deadline.

Tony de Brum, foreign minister of the Marshall Islands - which are the most at risk from rising sea levels - warned there had been a "co-ordinated campaign to gut the text" of ambition by some countries.

Indian environment minister Prakash Javadekar accused some developing countries of not showing enough flexibility towards poorer, more vulnerable countries.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in