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During intermediate climate talks in Bonn, Germany, last week the head of the United Nations Climate Change Secretariat Yvo de Boer said the price of dealing with climate change is enormous — $300 billion, he said.
The UN Environment Programme said the meeting in Bonn was only somewhat effective and that financing adapting to climate warming and transitioning energy sources was a difficult topic.
"The world will need a phenomenal amount of money to change its energy supply from fossil fuels to cleaner sources and to adapt to climate change," de Boer said.
He predicts that $100 billion will be needed to deal with climate change adaptation, such as recovery after floods and drought. The cost of reducing worldwide emissions he estimates to be $200 billion per year.
According to UNEP, many world leaders disagree as to who should bear the financial burden of the global warming crisis. De Boer emphasized burden-sharing rather than forcing individual countries to fund a specific sum. Countries participating in the December conference in Copenhagen that will replace the Kyoto Treaty should come with as much as $10 billion on the table, he suggested.
Two more meetings are slated for UN climate talks prior to Copenhagen; one in Bangkok, Thailand, at the end of September and another in Barcelona in early November.
