Need for a clearer post-Copenhagen roadmap
AFTER several rounds of discussion, filled with brinksmanship and 11th-hour negotiations on the concluding evening of the Copenhagen Summit conference (between the USA, the EU, China, India and Brazil), President Obama has claimed that there had been "an unprecedented breakthrough," and that a climate deal had been forged. The accord is significant in that it codifies the commitments of individual nations to act on their own to tackle global warming. Some members of the G-20 have also stressed that the accord has provided a system (a compromise on an issue over which China bargained hard) for monitoring and reporting progress toward national pollution-reduction goals. It has also set a goal of limiting the global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels by 2050, implying cuts in climate-altering emissions over the next four decades. Attention has also been drawn to the fact that rich countries will provide $30 billion of climate aid over the next three years and $100 billion a year from 2020 to developing countries. The US has announced by far the lowest pledge. It will contribute $3.6 billion between 2010 and 2012, while Japan will give $11 billion and the European Union $10.6 billion.
Despite this spin, it is also clear that the conference has not been an unqualified success.
It has fallen short of what was required to combat global warming. It is equally evident that it has not met the modest expectations that leaders had set for this meeting, notably, the setting up of a 2010 goal for reaching a binding international treaty to seal the provisions of the accord. Nor does the plan firmly commit the industrialised nations or the developing nations to firm targets for midterm or long-term greenhouse gas emissions reductions.
To many, this has been a disappointing conclusion to a two-year process that had the goal of producing a comprehensive and enforceable action plan for addressing dangerous changes to the global climate. The messy compromise mirrored the chaotic and non-transparent nature of the conference.
It has left many of the participants in the climate talks unhappy, from the Europeans, who now have the only binding carbon control regime in the world, to the delegates from the poorest nations, who objected to being left out of the critical negotiations. There have also been statements from some countries that they might not approve the deal. Washington has responded to this by pointing out that the agreement was merely a political statement and not a legally binding treaty and therefore might not need ratification by the entire conference.
The deal in Copenhagen was expected to deliver an agreement among 192 countries that are party to the Framework Convention on Climate Change, stipulating legally binding reduction commitments for carbon emission and firm pledges for financial assistance, technology transfer and adaptation funds for poor countries. Different countries called urgently for such a deal because they apprehended that a rise in global temperature by a further two degrees might trigger irreversible climate change. Unfortunately, all their efforts have not borne the desired results.
One aspect is however clear. Implementation of the converging points will entail profound shifts in energy production, dislocations in how and where people live, sweeping changes in agriculture and forestry and the creation of complex new markets in global warming pollution credits. The question then arises -- so what is this going to cost? The short answer is nearly one trillion US dollars over the next few decades. That is a significant sum but still a relatively small fraction of the world's total economic output. In energy infrastructure alone, the transformational ambitions are expected to cost the major part in additional investment from 2010 to 2030.
The International Energy Agency has however said that these costs would be largely offset by economic benefits in new jobs, improved lives, more secure energy supplies and a reduced danger of climate catastrophe. It has also been suggested that most of the investment will come from private rather than public funds. In addition, some of the hundreds of billions of dollars the poorer countries are demanding are expected to flow into the paradigm as global carbon markets become established and governments in rich countries begin to open the spigot of public spending.
Project Catalyst, an initiative of the European Union and Climate Works feels that about half of the required amount could come from the growing global market in carbon emissions credits under a cap-and-trade system, which is expected to be worth an estimated $2 trillion a year by 2020. It may be mentioned that a cap-and-trade system is already operating in Europe and is also under consideration by the US Congress. Such a system sets a ceiling on the carbon emissions of a given country or industry and allows trading of pollution permits within the cap.
One presumes that, as the overall limit on emissions grows tighter, the price of pollution permits will rise, creating a sizable market in carbon credits. It is felt that this money could be used to help developing nations reduce emissions by switching to renewable energy sources and also for adjusting to effects of a changing climate, like rising sea levels, by building flood walls or relocating settlements to higher ground. An additional $10 billion to $20 billion might also come from taxes on fuels used in aviation and shipping.
Bangladesh and other vulnerable nations called for an appropriate transfer of wealth from the industrialised world to island nations and countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America that were most likely to feel the ravages of a changing climate. We pointed out in particular that the allocation from the Adaptation Fund be fixed in proportion to the percentage of population exposed to the potential effects of climate change. We also demanded that such sustained financial contribution be in addition to that already envisioned under the Overseas Development Assistance goal of 0.7 per cent of the national income of developed countries.
Well, the results achieved in Copenhagen have not met our immediate expectations. However there is no need to be totally discouraged.
The Copenhagen announcement has been but a first step, and much work remains to be done in the days and months ahead to seal a final international climate deal that is fair, binding and ambitious. From that context it is imperative that negotiations resume as soon as possible.
There is the issue of insufficient financial resources but there is also the remaining questions of which country should contribute how much, what body should oversee the spending and how to determine which projects qualify for finance. We will also need long-term cooperative action under the climate change framework to address areas like compensation for countries for preserving forests, and in some cases, other natural landscapes like peat soils, swamps and fields that play a crucial role in curbing climate change.
It is true that the Copenhagen agreement has been a compromise and not a detailed 'operational accord.' It has not turned out to be a significant or a decisive moment of change.
Nevertheless, we still have to garner the necessary political will and commitment to find solutions to intractable points. We have to view this whole process not only as a humanitarian imperative but also as a moral obligation and an investment in our common security. We have to remember that climate change continues to pose a grave and growing danger to the world. The question before us is no longer the nature of the challenge, but our capacity to meet it
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel.
Comments