'The alarm bells keep ringing' says Obama at climate change summit in New York

During the United Nations Climate Summit meeting in New York on September 23, President Obama appealed to the international community to make greater strides towards creating and enforcing carbon caps, explaining that climate change is happening at a faster pace than international efforts to address it.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - "Nobody gets a pass," he declared at the summit which was attended by international and business leaders. "We have to raise our collective ambition."

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The summit was held in part to increase supports for a global treaty aimed to slow and reverse climate change, that is set to be finalized in 2015.

At the summit, Obama said that the United States is doing its part, and is on track to meet its goal of cutting carbon pollution by 17% from 2005 levels by 2020.

But, he remarked, the U.S. and the world still have a long way to go.

"The alarm bells keep ringing. Our citizens keep marching," he said. "We can't pretend we can't hear them. We need to answer the call. We need to cut carbon emission in our countries to prevent worse effects, adapt and work together as a global community to tackle this global threat before it is too late."

China and the U.S. are the largest polluters, the president said. But the U.S. has become a leader in fighting back against pollution, and China needs to step up and do the same.

There were 120 world leaders at the U.N. summit, and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon asked that representatives who attend the summit, arrive with their nations' specific pledges as a way to prove their commitment to the treaty.

President Obama also pledged to help other nations meet their carbon-cutting goals; and the U.S. will give $15 million to a World Bank program designed to help poorer nations fund projects that reduce methane pollution.

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