NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) — A summit of city mayors will convene in February of next year in Johannesburg, to discuss ways to fight global climate change.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who serves as chairman of the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, announced plans Tuesday along with Johannesburg Mayor Parks Tau for the fifth biennial C40 Cities Mayors Summit.

“Cities around the world, particularly C40 cities, are taking meaningful actions that have quantifiable outcomes. As a result – as our research shows – we are having a real impact combating the impacts of global climate change,” Bloomberg said in a news release. “While nations and international bodies meet to talk about these issues, the C40 Cities Mayors Summit is focused on the concrete actions we can take to protect the planet and grow our cities.”

C40 was started in 2005 and is a network of cities around the world looking to implement local actions that can impact climate change.

The group notes that while cities only occupy 2 percent of the whole land mass of the earth, they contain more than 50 percent of its population. Cities also use two thirds of the earths’ energy and generate over 70 percent of its carbon emissions.

Working together, cities could cut future emissions by 1.3 billion tons by 2030, C40 said.

The Johannesburg event will bring together C40 mayors, staffers and technical experts for a series of discussions about climate actions and their impacts.

Besides New York, the C40 cities in North America include Austin, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Mexico City, New Orleans, Philadelphia, Portland, San Francisco, Seattle, Toronto, Vancouver, and Washington, D.C. The C40 group also includes four cities in Africa, 15 in Asia, two in Australia, 18 in Europe, and eight in South America.

The conference in Johannesburg is scheduled for Feb. 4-6, 2014.

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