The difficult agenda at the climate summit

Thursday, 29 October 2009 13:34

With only some 30 days left before the United Nations climate conference gets under way in Copenhagen, CoolPlanet has had a closer look at the background to the negotiations and the difficult issues that are on the agenda.

“Making the climate agreement legally binding, as the EU wishes, seems to be like squaring a circle. With the Kyoto protocol it took three years of additional negotiations,” Danish daily Information writes in an article where it lays out the perplexity of the negotiation process and the confusion about what a politically and legally binding climate treaty actually is.

The launch pad is the UN climate convention from the Rio Summit in 1992 which has been ratified by almost all countries in the world. The convention is a framework agreement with the goal of stabilising the emission of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere to a level that will prevent the dangerous human-induced disturbance of the climate system. According to the text, the main responsibility is on the developed countries, but because the convention does not specify any requirements or contain legal commitments, negotiations kept going and ended in 1997 with the Kyoto protocol. The Kyoto protocol is ratified by 184 countries, but only the Annex 1 countries, i.e. the 37 developed countries, are legally bound by the treaty to reduce their level of CO2 emissions.

Hereby the dilemma, Information writes: The Kyoto protocol expires in 2012 and a new agreement is needed to set the framework for yet a period of years. In the light of growing global emissions and accelerating climate changes, this new agreement should strengthen the efforts and commitments by everyone. But how do you make a forward thinking agreement that includes everybody – and hereby also the US, China and India – in a legally binding system? Can and will all countries agree to a binding protocol with judicial control systems and possibility for sanctions? Or should the legal commitments still apply only to the 37 developed countries?

The two tracks

Ever since the climate summit on Bali two years ago, this questions has remained unanswered, and the negotiations have followed two parallel tracks: the Kyoto track where the 37 developed countries talk about a continuation of the Kyoto protocol and, in that connection, about their new judicial commitments. Then there is the Convention track where all countries discuss an updated clarification of the goals of the Climate Convention. This means that when the negotiators have meet in Bali, Poznan, Bonn and in other places, two parallel talks have always been going on at the same time.

According to Information, the dream for the EU, among others, is to let the two tracks merge so that in Copenhagen the negotiations will end in one judicial and political agreement covering all countries, but with different requirements for the different groups of countries. This means a kind of universal Kyoto agreement which also commits countries like the US, China and India in a legally binding way.

The US is determined not to ratify the Kyoto model and thereby follows their tradition of rarely ratifying any legally binding international agreements. The Obama government wants to take action and be committed, but it has to be on the basis of nationally adopted goals. China, India, and many developing countries in G77 want to maintain the binding Kyoto model towards the developed countries, but also want the US to be bound by it. However, they do not themselves want to be bound by legal commitments. Therefore, both China and India are talking about finalising the agreement in two tracks.

For the first time, during the latest negotiations in Bangkok, the EU officially said that they want one common legally binding agreement. Several spokespersons from the developing countries saw this as an attempt from the EU to run away from their Kyoto obligations. And when Canada from the lectern announced that all countries should strive to go for a brand new common treaty – with the Kyoto as a model – it led to a mass walkout by many of the developing countries. In their eyes, the EU and Canada are trying either to get out of their own legal commitments or to enforce the commitments on the developing countries.

This is where we are now. The EU wants to solve the squaring of the circle once and for all. The US and many of the developing countries do not.

Wrapping it up

Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC, Yvo de Boer, recently said that the discussion is a bit like a fight about what paper to use for the wrapping of a gift you have not yet bought.

About the “gift” itself and its content, all the big questions still remain unanswered and only five days of negotiations in Barcelona are left.

The developed countries promises of CO2 reductions of 17 per cent by 2020 is still fare away from the developing countries demand of 40 per cent, and the climate experts recommendations of 25-40 per cent.

It is still doubtful whether the American Congress will succeed on a climate law in time, which can give Obama a ready negotiating mandate, as there is still uncertainty about at least 20 of the needed votes in the Senate.

The developed countries have still not given any concrete promises about financial support to the developing countries in their climate efforts. The EU Heads of State and Government are meeting today and Friday to discuss this. If they do not put the money on the table now, it will most likely not happen until the next EU summit, which takes place parallel with the Copenhagen summit. This would be to gamble with the developing countries patience and with the climate treaty itself.

There is still disagreement about how the necessary new climate money should be administered – by an already existing international institution or by e.g. a new fund where the developing countries have real influence.

The large developing countries have still not shown the will take on downright international commitments to reduce their CO2. In return, countries like China, India, Brazil, Mexico and Indonesia are turning towards still more and more ambitious domestic climate programmes.

According to Information, the Prime Minister of Denmark, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, is now trying to increase the pressure for agreement by in the coming weeks having conversations in an improvised network - The Copenhagen Commitment Circle - with central heads of state. At the same time, Danish Minister for the Climate and Energy, Connie Hedegaard, is summoning secretary colleagues from a number of countries to discuss the situation in Copenhagen in the middle of November.

“It is certain that if we keep the previous pace we will not make it in the remaining weeks,” said Lars Løkke Rasmussen.

Source: Information, Denmark