UN 2018 Climate Talks May Be Disrupted due to Hot Weather

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Sizzling weather this summer will put pressure on almost 200 governments to reach a deal in Poland in December on the details of a global plan to limit climate change, the incoming president of the U.N. talks said.

Environment ministers will meet in Katowice, the heart of Poland's coal-producing region, Silesia, to agree on rules for the 2015 Paris climate accord. That accord set a sweeping goal of ending the fossil fuel era this century, but the text was vague on details.

"Paris is empty without Katowice," Michal Kurtyka, a former deputy energy minister of Poland who will preside at the December 3-14 talks, told Reuters.

Poland, which generates most of its electricity from coal, is hosting the annual U.N. climate talks for the third time.

"The Paris Agreement includes certain principles. However, the way they will be implemented will be described in the Katowice package. So the more detailed and concrete it is, the better," Kurtyka said.

Hot weather this summer that set off wildfires from California to Greece has made officials more determined to reach a detailed deal in Katowice, he said.

"For sure this is something that affected millions of people all over the world. ... Societies in particular countries will act on politicians. I think that this will increase political determination for the solutions to be as concrete and as
detailed as possible," Kurtyka said.