As the U.N. Conference of the Parties (COP20) talks enter their last scheduled day in Lima, Peru on Friday, remarks delivered by U.S. Secretary of State late Thursday to climate negotiators from around the world, though welcomed by some, seemed to do very little in terms of moving the talks closer to the kind of agreement experts say are necessary to adequately tackle the crisis of human-caused global warming.

Kerry sounded notes of urgency and shared purpose in his remarks to the delegates as he stated, “Rest assured, if we fail, future generations will not and should not forgive those who ignore this moment, no matter their reasoning. Future generations will judge our effort not just as a policy failure, but as a massive, collective moral failure of historic consequence, particularly if we’re just bogged down in abstract debates. They will want to know how we together could possibly have been so blind, so ideological, so dysfunctional, and frankly, so stubborn that we failed to act on knowledge that was confirmed by so many scientists in so many studies over such a long period of time and documented by so much evidence.”

“Secretary Kerry should ask his boss to use every tool he can to fight the climate catastrophe we are facing – including the cessation of the sale of publicly-owned fossil fuels and a significant strengthening of EPA climate policy. The US should increase their 2025 climate pollution reduction target from 28 to 40% and commit to it in an internationally legally binding agreement next year. Our transition to 100% renewable energy by 2050 depends on it.”
—Kyle Ash, Greenpeace

Meanwhile, as the Guardian‘s Suzanne Goldenberg reported, with talks scheduled to conclude Friday, delegates had agreed “on just one paragraph of a deal” and she quoted the Union of Concerned Scientist expert Alden Meyer who said negotiators were “going backward,” not forward on a quality agreement.

Though some U.S.-based climate action groups welcomed Kerry’s arrival at the talks and his lofty rhetoric on climate, none seemed convinced that the U.S. contributions at the summit or its standing positions on climate action are nearly adequate to the task.

“We appreciate [Sec. Kerry’s] comments on the urgency of creating a clean energy economy,” said Kyle Ash, Greenpeace’s top legislative advisor. “His record as a climate champion, however, contrasts with many of the US positions in the Lima COP negotiations.”

350.org’s Jamie Henn, also attending the summit in Lima, said Kerry “sure sounded like someone who was gearing up” for strong action on climate change, but argued Kerry’s calls for others to act would mean little if the U.S. approves new dirty energy projects like the Keystone XL pipeline; refuses to make stronger emissions cuts; or continues to ramp up oil and gas exploration and fossil fuel exports.

“Fancy words are worth nothing if they aren’t backed up with action,” Henn said.

 According to Karen Orenstein, senior climate analyst with Friends of the Earth US, the gap between Kerry’s rhetoric and U.S. commitments is more like a chasm.

“It is past time to put words into action,” Orenstein said. “The emissions cuts the US has put forward put us on a path for a global temperature increase well beyond the already dangerous 2C level. Secretary Kerry said, ‘If you’re a big developed nation and you are not helping to lead, then you’re part of the problem.’ Regrettably, the US is a tremendous part of the problem, and as the hundreds of thousands of people on the streets of Lima and New York have demanded, this must change immediately.”

“It is past time to put words into action.” —Karen Orenstein, Friends of the EarthOrenstein was referencing the People’s Climate March in New York City earlier this year and a large march in Lima outside the talks on Wednesday where civil society organizations, Indigenous groups, and climate justice advocates rallied for a far-reaching draft agreement at this summit which would be finalized at the next round of talks scheduled for Paris in 2015.