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FACTS Conference Says Climate Change Is Now

Laine Kaplan-Levenson
/
WWNO

The French Embassy in the United States and Tulane University came together earlier this week to present the French American Climate Talks, or FACTS. The conference series travels to cities in the United States and Canada to engage scientists and policymakers in discussions about the impacts of climate change, and how we can prepare to face them.

The FACTS series is building towards the United Nations Climate Change Conference in France next year. The opening panel of the New Orleans conference began with a question: What is the role of scientists in the case of climate change? This made visiting panelist Valerie Masson-Delmotte ask who in the room has been to a science climate class.

Seeing roughly seven people in a room of over 100 raise their hands, Masson-Delmotte continued. “Okay, you can see the problem, and when we speak with policymakers, they have not been.”

Masson-Delmotte is the senior scientist in a French climate research center. She says people are still not educated enough on the subject. Climate change should be taught in schools, she says, just like History and English. Scientists are in a tricky situation: they’re meant to inform the policymakers, not determine the policy.

The FACTS conference held in the LavinBernik center of Tulane University brought together French and American representatives to look at science and policy, and discuss why climate change is still more of a debate than a movement.

Mark Davisis the Director of the Institute on Water Resources Law and Policy at Tulane Law School. He moderated the panels, and asked another question:

“How strong is the consensus in the scientific community that these things are in fact happening? Because I want to believe that these things are not happening.”

Tulane Geology Professor Torbjorn E. Tornqvist took this one on, on behalf of the scientific community. “We are known for disagreeing with each other on pretty much anything you can imagine. So when there are a few of these remaining things that we actually have such strong consensus on, that alone is a strong indicator that there’s some merit to it.”

Tornqvist says that unfortunately, a majority of the United States Congress is still in denial about climate change being an issue. He says the uncertainty should not be able whether climate change is happening, but how to deal with it.

The FACTS conference continues tomorrow in Vancouver and closes later this week in Los Angeles.

Support for WWNO's Coastal Desk comes from the Walton Family Foundation, the Greater New Orleans Foundation, and the Kabacoff Family Foundation.

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