Last month, representatives from 195 nations reached a landmark agreement that will commit nearly every country for the first time to lowering planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions in order to help stave off the most drastic and devastating effects of climate change. When fully implemented the agreement will signal the end of fossil fuels, because it limits the increase in global average temperatures to less than two degrees above pre-industrial levels, beyond which scientists say we will see the worst extremes of global warming.

The North Texas economy, while historically benefiting from the fossil fuel industry, is also poised to significantly benefit from the inevitable shift to clean energy renewable; primarily via our wind energy production and transmission capabilities. Here, the over abundance of greenhouse gases has caused us to labeled with federal air quality standards non-attainment status for more than 10 years, with many ozone warning days.

The core of the Paris agreement is a requirement that every nation take part. It has built in a series of legally binding requirements that countries ratchet up the stringency of their climate change policies in the future. Countries will be legally required to reconvene every five years, starting in 2020, with updated plans that would tighten their emissions cut, revisit the pledges they have made and then make new pledges every five years thereafter.