The countries at the Durban climate conference made an agreement to make an agreement. I am skeptical they will make an agreement in 2015, which would not take effect until 2020. For the time being, the world will still operate under the auspices of the Kyoto protocol, which only covered industrialized nations, and to which the United States, one of the world’s biggest emitters, is not a signatory.

Recessions tend to depress economic productivity and reduce demand for electricity generation (a primary source of carbon emissions in the US and China). That results in less greenhouse gas emissions. But that brief reprieve on emissions has ended, according to the latest studies, accelerating the climate crisis.