The heads of the 13 biggest emitters, including the U.S., China, and France, will not be present at this year's U.N. climate change conference.

The climate talks often have the star power of a soccer World Cup, but many big names and powerful countries are noticeably absent. That includes the top leaders of the 13 largest carbon dioxide-polluting countries.

In a year of weather extremes, four nations with more than 42% of all the world's population – China, the U.S., India and Indonesia – do not have heads of state present.