Scotland calls on members of the international community to follow its lead by adopting ambitious climate change policies, a minister said Monday.
Scottish Environment and Climate Change Minister Aileen McLeod headed to Lima, Peru, to take part in U.N. climate talks aimed at adopted a new global climate pact by next year.
"I am taking a very strong message to the U.N. meeting in Lima," she said in a statement. "The international community must match Scotland's world-leading climate change ambitions."
The Scottish government has one of the most ambitious low-carbon strategies in the world, looking to power its entire economy on renewable resources by the next decade.
The Lima summit comes less than a week after the World Meteorological Organization said 2014 is on pace to be one of the hottest years on record. Its provisional estimate is that the global average air temperature over land and sea surfaces through October was a full degree Fahrenheit above the benchmark set from 1961-90.
"The scientific evidence could not be clearer," McLeod said. "The world is getting warmer and greenhouse gas emissions from mankind are extremely likely to be the dominant cause of climate change."
A failed Scottish bid for independence from the United Kingdom this year placed the low-carbon economy at the top of its platform. Backers said an independent Scotland could've financed itself with oil and gas revenue from the North Sea while drawing on renewables to power the economy.
