The Copenhagen Sea-saw

At the G8 summit of world leaders in L'Aquila, Italy June 2009, all nations agreed for the first time to limit the rise in average global temperature to 2^oC. However, they failed to reach an accord on capping for reducing greenhouse gases.

( Leaders of the G8 summit in L'Aquila, Italy )

It would not be wrong to say that every country, be it China, the US, EU, India, Brazil or Japan..., agrees to emissions reduction, but as minimal and manageable as each can accommodate, so as not to jeopardize its economic growth. What is not agreeable is, understandably, the amount of capping imposed, normally higher than an amount a nation would want to commit.

Negotiations to seal a climate change treaty at the upcoming meeting COP 15 in Copenhagen come December 2009 have been dogged by numerous issues. The most challenging of them being: disagreements over targets for cuts in carbon emissions; and a fund from rich nations to help developing countries tackle climate change. A particular feature of importance too, is the committal participation of China, without which there will be no meaning in whatever outcome arrived. China by year end 2006 had overtaken the US to be the biggest carbon dioxide emitter in the world.

The planned treaty, due to take effect from 2013 as the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol, will shape planetary action for years the number of which will be decided later.

China, India and other developing nations have been putting up a front of stiff opposition to binding emission targets that could harm economic growth and poverty alleviation. Instead, they urged developed nations like the US to honor their international duty to cut emissions by 40% - 45% in view of their historic greenhouse gas emissions which are responsible for today’s global warming. The common standing is that the developed countries who are supposed to have taken action, should show their proportionate commitment first.

India's environment minister, Jairam Ramesh, who very publicly confronted US secretary of state, on what is arguably President Obama's highest global priority, a rigorous climate change agreement. India refuses to "take any legally binding emissions reductions."

"There is simply no case for the pressure that we, who have been among the lowest emitters per capita, face to actually reduce emissions." He was adamant that India could not, would

		not, "actually reduce emissions." Pointing to a provision in the Waxman-Markey bill for U.S. tariffs against countries that do not limit their emissions, he said, "we also face the threat of carbon tariffs on our exports to countries such as yours." (President Barack Obama meets with India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at the G-20 summit April 2009)

Brazil's president Lula observed, "A country that started its industrialization process 150 years ago has more responsibility than one starting yesterday; the United States has more responsibility than China, and Europe more than South America or Africa."

In separate speeches on their visit to Beijing on July 15 2009, US Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke acknowledged that developed nations such as the U.S. bore most of the responsibility for the rise in emissions. Both also said China must take measures to rein in its growth in greenhouse emissions to prevent potentially catastrophic global warming. Both are on a mission to remove trade barriers hindering private-sector cooperation with China on clean energy.

"The developed world did make the problem, I admit that, but the developing world can make it much worse." according to Chu.

( Pic: Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao met with U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Trade Secretary Gary Locke in July 2009, to highlight the importance of collaboration on trade and energy)

“It’s been said that it’s unjust to ask China and other developing nations to drastically reduce their carbon emissions, when countries like the United States have spent 150 years using coal, oil and other dirty fuels to grow their economies,” Locke told U.S. business leaders in Beijing. “That’s an understandable point, but one of no concern to Mother Nature.”

Elliot Diringer from Pew Center on Global Climate Change, said that getting China to agree to emissions reductions at Copenhagen may be challenging.

China and the U.S. are the world’s biggest dependants on coal-based energy. Together they account for about 42% of global carbon dioxide emission, blamed for global warming. Cooperation between the two is considered essential for reaching a new treaty come December 2009 in Copenhagen. Both have agreed in principle to boost investment and cooperation in energy efficient green technology. This, being part of their common economic stimulus package to combat climate change, could also help the Obama administration in getting the U.S. Congress to pass climate change legislation.

Increasingly, China's involvement is seen as crucial to any efforts to combat global warming because of its vast population and speedy economic growth. While refusing to any binding capping, China acknowledges the risks of global warming. To combat climate change from a different front, China adopts a practical economic approach with active engagement of renewable energies for a cleaner environment, positioning itself in the forefront of green technologies.

With the major emerging economies taking a common stand on one side of the Copenhagen negotiation sea-saw, and the developed nations the other side; each party stiffly adhering to their justifications and numbers on binding targets, the war to combat climate change appears to be long and obscure. US only want to commit a 4% reduction of the 1990 level, whilst EU, Japan.....more.

Climate change is a global crisis, but the talks to address this issue are themselves in crisis, as shown by the impasse in numerous negotiations.

The winning factor is probably the much needed hearty commitment (binding targets) and actual action taken (engagement and transfer of green technologies, actual reductions carried out at all levels).

Summit on Climate Change in New York on 22 September 2009

At a United Nations World Leaders Summit in New York September 2009, with the attendance of more than 100 world leaders, the focus was on China's premier Hu and his US counterpart Barack Obama who together may hold the fate of the new treaty in their hands. President Hu promised to reduce greenhouse gases by a notable margin, measured by units of gross domestic product, a target of 15 per cent for renewable energy and to increase China's national forest coverage by 40 million hectares by 2020.

India at the same summit in New York, agrees for the first time to set targets for its greenhouse gas emissions reduction, through a series of mitigation measures to reduce India's energy intensity by a further 5 per cent to 10 per cent. These include a mandatory fuel efficiency target; a more energy efficient building code; and an increase in renewable energy generation to 20 per cent by 2020; stepping up efforts to stop deforestation while increasing tree cover to 15 per cent by 2020.

The moves by the two Asian developing giants are seen to add pressure on the Obama administration to deliver on its own climate pledges.

"The threat from climate change is serious, it is urgent, and it is growing. And the time we have to reverse this tide is running out," the US President said. "We are determined to act and to take our responsibility for future generations."

Latest updates:

In the US, the White House said President Barack Obama would go to the December 7-18 2009 climate change summit in Copenhagen, with an offer to cut US emissions by 3 % below 2005 levels by 2012, 17% by 2020, 42% by 2030, 80% by 2050

These levels fall short of those embraced in the negotiating blueprint drew up in Bali in 2007.. That blueprint envisions developed countries cutting greenhouse-gas emissions by a collective 25 - 40% below 1990 levels by 2020, and by 80 - 95% below 1990 levels by 2050.

Both Washington and Beijing face domestic pressure from business and political constituencies pressing their governments not to make energy and environmental pledges that could limit economic growth during a recession. In the US, members of Congress made it clear enough to the Obama administration that they would not approve any treaty that did not include a firm promise from major developing countries, particularly China and India, to at least slow the growth of emissions. (Post-gazette November, 27, 2009)

China, almost immediately after US announcements, on November 26, 2009, says it is taking a voluntary action based on its own national conditions to air for energy efficiency, to cut carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product by up to 45% by 2020. Though China is not an Annex I country thus not bound by the Kyoto Protocol to meet reductions target, it is in a very special category as it had by 2007, overtaken US as the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases. As Kim Carstensen, the leader of WWF’s global climate initiative put it: “Given the size of China’s economy, the decoupling of China’s economic growth from growth in emissions is one of the most important factors that will determine whether the world can get on course to keep temperature rise below two degrees Celsius."

References and related news:

Climate Heartburn: takingnote.tcf.org July 2009
China Emissions Cleanup Is Urged: wsj July 16, 2009
US China Coordinating on Climate Change: npr.org
Chu Optimistic on Climate Talks After China Visit : bloomberg July 16, 2009
US China Launch Clean Vehicle Building Project Reuters July 15 2009
India Says Developed Nations are Responsible for Climate Change: Bloomberg July 07, 2009
United Nations Climate Change Conference Dec 7 - Dec 18 2009
China's Position On the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference: CCCHINA

Top »