USA

Obama: US is 'Global Leader' in Climate Change Fight

FILE - Cattle graze in a pasture against a backdrop of wind turbines near Vesper, Kan., in this 2015 photo.

U.S. President Barack Obama says America has become a "global leader in the fight against climate change," what he described in his weekly address as "one of the most urgent challenges of our time."He noted that "2015 surpassed 2014 as the warmest year on record, and 2016 is on pace to be even hotter."

The president said, however, that over the past seven-and-a-half years, "we've made ambitious investments in clean energy and ambitious reductions in our carbon emissions," resulting in clean power sources" that are "finally cheaper than dirtier, conventional power."

The president said American climate change leadership "helped us bring nearly 200 nations together in Paris" last year around the "most ambitious agreement in history to save the one planet we've got." President Obama said the agreement was "something to build upon" in order to "leave a better, cleaner, safer future for our children."