Yogi Berra may have said it best:

“If you don’t know where you are going, you might wind up someplace else.”

So, where is the world headed in trying to address global warming? There are vast amounts of ongoing scientific research and constant international policy discussions, but there seems to be no overall coordinated plan of action. Scientists have projected what will happen if green house gas emissions continue unchecked, but there is no overall action plan defining what must be done instead.

In 1979, the World Meteorological Organization, several United Nations entities and the World Health Organization sponsored the First World Climate Conference in Geneva. In many ways, this event marked the beginning of the international effort to understand and address climate change.

Since then, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has been established to fill the lead worldwide role for assessing climate change. The panel evaluates scientific data and research, and it develops technical reports designed to assist policy development by decision makers. The information compiled and assessed by IPCC is highly relevant for helping create a global action plan, but it does not go so far as to define the steps to be taken.

On the policy side, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is the underlying international treaty for countries to cooperate in limiting the concentrations of atmospheric greenhouse gases and to respond to human-induced global warming. Introduced in 1992 as part of the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, this treaty is the foundation for all the more specific international climate agreements that have been negotiated since.

Building on UNFCCC, the Kyoto Protocol (adopted 1997) includes specific commitments by some industrialized countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, the protocol includes only modest reductions for many countries and does not cover or have commitments covering significant emissions (e.g., United States, developing countries, international aviation, shipping). In reality, many parts of the world have seen greenhouse gas emissions increase in relation to the protocol baseline date of 1990.

The Cancun Agreements in 2010 resulted in setting a goal of keeping the average global temperature rise below 2°C compared to pre-industrial levels. That level was selected using data and modeling, and is based on a level expected to avoid the worst effects of climate change. This is the primary quantifiable global goal that has come out of UNFCCC, and while tied to the recognition that deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions are required, this goal is not linked back to the targeted greenhouse gas emission reductions in place.

Much of the work that has developed out of the last several U.N. Climate Change Conferences (Bali, Copenhagen, Cancun, Durbin, Doha) has led to the realization that much more needs to be done, because global greenhouse gas emissions and concentrations continue to rise. These conferences have set in motion steps to create a universal climate change agreement that covers all countries and will be adopted in 2015. The hope is that national and international efforts will become better tied together and that emission reductions will collectively keep average global temperatures from rising too far.

It may be that implementation of climate change policies and tactics will be most effective if implemented on a smaller geographic basis. Many countries have developed some type of plan for addressing greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. In the United States, the majority of states have developed their own ‘action plans’ for dealing with climate and energy issues.

Nevertheless, without a guiding global action plan, the smaller plans will remain out of context and not aligned to accomplish the overall global goals. Climate change is a worldwide challenge and needs to be directed and coordinated at that level. Only then, can component pieces build into the overall solutions.