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This is the inconvenient truth: Governments are undermining the Paris climate agreement just seven years after they signed it. And nearly all the large companies that announced pledges to bring their net carbon emissions down to zero have failed to produce plans matching their words. Dozens of national leaders are scheduled to come to the desert resort town for the conference, which runs through Nov. 18. Among them is President Joe Biden, who the White House has said will attend next Friday to “highlight the need for the world to act in this decisive decade.” On the other hand, Chinese President Xi Jinping, whose country ranks No. 1 among current greenhouse gas polluters, plans to skip the summit. Those leaders who do attend can expect their green promises to meet a lot of skepticism. Arou...

China should contribute its own funds to the cause, U.S. Special Envoy John Kerry told reporters late last month, “especially if they think they’re going to continue to go on to the next 30 years with increasing their emissions.” John Kerry, special presidential envoy for climate, speaks during a briefing at the State Department on Nov. 2, 2022. | Susan Walsh/AP Photo The issue, referred to as “loss and damage” in the parlance of the global talks, calls for the U.S. and Europe’s industrialized nations to send funding to less-developed countries that have suffered from floods, heatwaves, droughts, rising seas and other disasters worsened by the changing climate. Those nations have contributed little to the crisis — in contrast to the United States, which during the past two centuries has pu...