"We all have the opportunity and the obligation to do our part to combat climate change," he told AFP after signing the bill into law. But "glass-half-full" optics cannot obscure the fact that global warming continues to outpace efforts to tame it, in the US and across the globe. A monster hurricane threatening to unleash "catastrophic" flooding and storm surges on the US East Coast -- bearing the telltale fingerprint of climate change -- underscores that reality. "If we do not change course by 2020, we risk missing the point where we can avoid runaway climate change," UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said earlier this week, warning of a "dark and dangerous future." The 196-nation Paris Agreement calls for capping global warming at "well below" two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit), and vows to strive for a 1.5 C limit if possible.

Source: Bangkok Post September 12, 2018 18:11 UTC