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Annual UN climate summits are never moments of unbridled optimism,
每年一度的联合国气候峰会从来不是盲目乐观的时刻，
but this year's, held in Madrid and dubbed COP25, was particularly dispiriting. Its logo was a clock with its hands at a quarter to 12.
但今年在马德里举办的COP25联合国气候峰会尤其令人沮丧。其标志是一个指针指向十二点差一刻的钟。
Midnight duly passed on Friday December 13th—supposedly the summit's last day, and then again on Saturday.
12月13日周五，可能是峰会的最后一天，午夜准时过去了，然后周六又过去了。
Only on Sunday did delegates agree to weak and watered-down commitments to enact previously promised cuts in emissions of greenhouse gases.
到了周日，代表才同意在实施之前承诺的减少温室气体排放方面做出软弱无力的妥协。
And they deferred until next year a decision on regulating a new international carbon market.
他们还将是否建立一个新的国际碳市场的决定推迟到了明年。
In 2015, in Paris, nearly 200 countries promised to stop global warming
2015年，在巴黎，200个国家承诺
before average temperatures rose by more than 1.5-2°C above pre-industrial levels.
在全球平均气温较工业化水平上升1.5-2摄氏度之前阻止全球变暖。
Most climate scientists, though, admit privately that there is little hope of this.
虽然大部分气候科学家私下里承认，这几乎没有希望。
A coalition of governments including the European Union therefore came to Madrid demanding a strongly worded final text
因此，包括欧盟在内的一个政府联盟来到马德里，要求拿出一份措辞强硬的最终文本，
that would urge all countries to promise in 2020 to cut emissions further and faster than agreed so far. That text failed to materialise.
敦促所有国家承诺在2020年进一步、更快地削减碳排放。该文本未能成为现实。
In fact, the real effort on this front came from Brussels, where the EU's leaders, after some wrangling,
事实上，在这方面真正的努力来自布鲁塞尔，在那里，欧盟领导人们经过一番争论后
committed themselves on December 12th to reducing emissions to "net zero" by 2050.
于12月12日做出承诺，到2050年将排放量减少到“零排放”。
This means any release of greenhouse gases thereafter will be balanced by the capture of such gases already in the atmosphere by, say, extra afforestation.
这意味着，今后任何温室气体的排放，都将通过额外的植树造林等措施来平衡大气中已经存在的温室气体的捕获。
The European Commission's presidency has published a comprehensive and ambitious,
欧盟委员会主席已为实现这一目标的措施，
if sometimes vague, proposal for measures that would achieve this goal.
发表了一份全面而雄心勃勃的提案，虽然内容模糊。
As part of it, an EU climate law enshrining the 2050 target will be put forward in the spring of 2020.
作为措施的一部分，欧盟将在2020年春季提出一项规定2050年目标的气候法律。
Weak and watered-down commitments to enact cuts in emissions of greenhouse gases are nothing new.
制定削减温室气体排放的承诺力度不够并不是什么新鲜事。
What COP25 is really likely to be remembered for, though, is a failure to deal with carbon markets.
COP25真正让人铭记的可能是应对碳市场方面的失败。
Plans for such markets go back to a scheme created by the Kyoto protocol, a treaty signed in 1992.
这类市场的计划可以追溯到1992年签署的《京都议定书》。
An arcane technical clause in the Paris agreement then offered a framework for linking existing national or regional markets
《巴黎协定》中的一项晦涩难懂的技术条款为连接现有国家或地区市场提供了框架
and thus creating a new global one that would be administered by the UN and offer access to countries that do not have their own.
并因此建立一个新的全球市场，由联合国管理，并向没有自己市场的国家提供准入。
译文由可可原创，仅供学习交流使用，未经许可请勿转载。
