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blue bits. red rocks.
Monday 9 November 2009

But the other gap—just as fundamental—is between how much the rich countries are willing to pay for a climate agreement and how much the poor countries require. Questions of justice are very clear here: Rich countries are rich in large part because they’ve spent 200 years burning fossil fuels. Poor countries won’t be able to follow that strategy to develop, if we intend to keep the planet habitable. And because of their locations, they’re already bearing the brunt of the effects of global warming. So they need help both coping with those consequences and developing without coal. Through no fault of their own, they need seawalls and they need windmills, and they don’t have the money to buy them. The West—for both moral and practical reasons—will need to pony up. Bill McKibben

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