The Biggest Hurdles Plaguing a Global Climate Accord, Explained

It was not with starry-eyed optimism, but with fierce determination that global climate negotiators launched their treaty talks in Lima on Monday. Nobody is suggesting that it will be easy to draft a comprehensive pact to be signed in Paris next year.

Rather, the leaders of the talks are simply asserting that failure is not an option, as they confront the reality that significant global warming is already locked in and this year's record-breaking temperatures are bound to be exceeded again and again.

"El mundo nos espera," said Peru's Manuel Pulgar Vidal, the presiding officer at the talks. "El mundo no espera que fallemos."   The world awaits us.  The world does not expect us to fail.

Here are just a few of the difficult pieces of the complex puzzle negotiators need to solve if they are to avoid failure.

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