One of the world's most prominent business leaders has expressed his fears over the "daunting" challenge of preventing dangerous climate change. Rick Samans, head of the Davos-based World Economic Forum, said the global effort to tackle the problem was beginning 10-15 years late. He said politicians had to act fast and set targets to cut CO2 emissions.
Mr Samans made his comments at a conference of the world's top 20 polluting nations in Mexico. "We are behind the curve, there is no doubt that we should have acted 10 or 15 years ago," he told BBC News. He added that businesses needed much more certainty about emissions targets before committing to investing billions of pounds in clean technology.
"It is very difficult to make a decision about a very expensive piece of equipment that you expect to last up to 50 years if one does not have a sense of the cost of that equipment," Mr Samans said.
He suggested that the delegates were also frustrated by the slow pace of progress, but expressed a degree of optimism that clean technology could be quickly adopted if governments sent out the right signals. "Having said that, it is not too late because human experience suggests we have underestimated the impact of technological change.
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5407998.stm