Climate Change Impacts on Urban Areas

Abstract

On the eve of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development's (UNCSD) conference on sustainable development (Rio+20) in June 2012, the United Nation's Environmental Program (UNEP)'s Global Outlook Report (GEO-5) provided sobering data on global environmental progress. The report indicated that world nations are making little headway on significant environmental targets set for themselves under the Millennium Development Goals. The UN indicated that world nations made progress on only 4 of the 90 most significant objectives from the Millennium Plan: reducing substances depleting the ozone layer, removing lead from fuel, increasing access to water supplies, and increasing research on ways to reduce pollution in marine environments. However, in some cases no progress or regression occurred in reaching goals on climate change issues including limiting increases in average global temperatures to less than two degrees above preindustrial levels nor advances in issues such as revitalization of depleted fish stocks, protection of biodiversity, and combating desertification (UNEP, 2012).

Citation

Holt, W.G. (2012), "Climate Change Impacts on Urban Areas", Holt, W.G. (Ed.) Urban Areas and Global Climate Change (Research in Urban Sociology, Vol. 12), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. xiii-xvii. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1047-0042(2012)0000012003