NEW YORK (AP) 鈥� Activists geared up Friday for protests around the world to demand action on climate change just as a pair of major weeklong climate events were getting underway in New York City.
The actions in Berlin, Brussels, Rio de Janeiro, New Delhi and many other cities were being organized by the youth-led group Fridays for Future, and included the group's New York chapter, which planned a march across the Brooklyn Bridge followed by a rally that organizers hoped would attract at least 1,000 people. More protests were planned Saturday and Sunday.
New York is hosting Climate Week NYC, an annual event that promotes climate action, at the same time the U.N. General Assembly takes up the issue on several fronts, including raising trillions of dollars to aid poorer countries suffering the most from climate change.
In Berlin, dozens of people took to the streets although in fewer numbers than in previous years. Activists held up signs saying 鈥淪ave the Climate鈥� and 鈥淐oal is Over!鈥� as they watched a gig put on outside the German Chancellor's Office. Protesters in London held up letters spelling out 鈥淧ay up," calling for the country to pay more to adapt to climate change and transition away from fossil fuels.
The New York protest wants to take aim at 鈥渢he pillars of fossil fuels鈥� 鈥� companies that pollute, banks that fund them, and leaders who are failing on climate, said Helen Mancini, an organizer and a senior at the city's Stuyvesant High School.
Youth climate protests started in August 2018 when , then an unknown 15-year-old, left school to stage a sit-down strike outside of the Swedish parliament to demand climate action and end fossil fuel use.
In the six years since Thunberg founded what became global carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels has increased by about 2.15%, according to Global Carbon Project, a group of scientists who monitor carbon pollution. The growth of emissions has slowed compared to previous decades and experts anticipate peaking soon, which is a far cry from needed to keep temperature increases to an agreed-upon limit.
Since 2019, carbon dioxide emissions from coal have increased by nearly , while natural gas emissions have increased slightly and oil pollution has dropped a tiny amount, according to the International Energy Agency. That growth has been driven by China, India and developing nations.
But emissions from advanced or industrialized economies have been falling and in 2023 were the lowest in more than 50 years, according to the IEA. Coal emissions in rich countries are down to levels seen around the year 1900 and the United Kingdom next month is
In the past five years, clean energy sources with both solar and wind individually growing faster than fossil fuel-based electricity, according to the IEA.
Since Thunberg started her protest six years ago, Earth with last year setting a record for the according to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the European climate agency Copernicus.
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Associated Press journalist David Keyton in Berlin contributed to this report.
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Seth Borenstein And Alexa St. John, The Associated Press
