TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Nations Set Path To Cut Emissions

ADVERTISEMENT

By THOMAS FULLER and ANDREW C. REVKIN, The New York Times

Published: December 16, 2007

NUSA DUA, Indonesia - In a tumultuous final session at international climate talks in which the U.S. delegates were booed and hissed, the world's nations committed Saturday to negotiating a new accord by 2009 that, in theory, would set the world on a course toward halving emissions of heat-trapping gases by 2050.

The finish to the negotiations came after a last-minute standoff during a day of high emotions, with the co-organizer of the conference, Yvo de Boer, fleeing the podium at one point as he held back tears.

The standoff started when developing countries demanded the United States agree that the eventual pact measure not only poorer countries' steps, but also the effectiveness of financial and technological assistance from wealthier ones.

The United States capitulated in that open session, which many observers and delegates said included more public acrimony than any of the treaty conferences since 1992, when countries drafted the original climate pact, the now-ailing Framework Convention on Climate Change. That change came after a more profound shift by the Bush administration, which agreed during the two-week conference to pursue a new pact fulfilling the unmet goals of the original treaty. The pact would take effect in 2012 when the only existing addendum, the Kyoto Protocol, expires.

U.S. Builds Up To Sea Change

While many observers described the United States' change as a U-turn, it was the culmination of months of movement by the Bush administration, which had for years insisted that the 1992 treaty, signed by the first President George Bush, was sufficient to avoid dangerous human interference with the climate.

In the 2005 talks in Montreal, for example, the U.S. negotiating team walked out of one session, rejecting any talk of formal negotiations to improve on that pact.

While accepting the need for a new agreement, in the end the United States retained the flexibility it had sought at the outset, fending off European attempts to set binding commitments on emission reductions. U.S. negotiators said this was vital to gain global consensus.

That success, though, was bemoaned by some observers.

Andrew Light, an expert on environmental ethics at the University of Washington who was in Bali, said that by keeping targets out of the two-year negotiating plan, the Bush administration had rejected the foreboding climate projections of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which it had praised in recent weeks.

'Same Continued Uncertainty'

"We could have moved on from here with a confident range of future cuts," Light said. "Instead, we have to move on with the same continued uncertainty. At the beginning of the week I was really heartened by the public praise the U.S. delegation was giving to the IPCC, and now I can't help but think, 'Was it all lip service?'"

Somewhat obscured by the focus on the U.S. delegation was another important shift: China, which has now surpassed the United States in carbon dioxide emissions, agreed for the first time to language that could commit developing countries to pursue emissions-cutting actions that are "measurable, reportable and verifiable."

The changing position of the Bush administration is likely a reflection of dramatic recent shifts in both the science and politics of climate change.

This year, a set of four reports emerged from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, each stating more clearly than ever that humans were warming the world, and that the unabated burning of fossil fuels and destruction of forests would lead to centuries of disrupted climate patterns, rising seas and ecological and social harm.

Along with the science came the Oscar-winning film "An Inconvenient Truth" and spiking oil prices. Finally, the Supreme Court rejected the Bush administration's contention that carbon dioxide was not a pollutant under the purview of the Environmental Protection Agency.

In May, President Bush signaled the change in his stance most powerfully when he announced his own parallel set of meetings with the countries accounting for 85 percent of greenhouse-gas emissions.

In Bali, European delegates threatened to pull out of those talks unless the Bush delegation agreed to keep some semblance of concrete targets in the outline for the talks.

Those targets remain in the agreement - including a possible cut in emissions of up to 40 percent below 1990 levels by rich countries by 2020, and a 50 percent cut in emissions globally by 2050 - but they are now a footnote to the nonbinding preamble.

Still, the Bush administration did not win everything it wanted. Other negotiators, particularly the Europeans, were looking beyond the current U.S. administration to the next one, and insisted that the next two years of talks proceed on two tracks. The second would build on the Kyoto Protocol, the 1997 update to the original treaty that requires specific emissions reductions in all major industrialized nations but has been rejected by the United States.

The U.S. team in Bali had fought against that, demanding that any new agreement encompass all the world's major polluters and have sufficient flexibility, and no hard targets, to do that.

But in the end the United States had to agree to two tracks to avoid a total breakdown of the talks.

CLIMATE AGENDA

Key points of the final decision at the U.N. climate change conference setting an agenda for talks on a new global warming pact:

Greenhouse Gas Emissions: It recognizes that "deep cuts" in global emissions will be required to prevent dangerous human interference in the climate. It references reports that suggest cuts between 25 percent and 40 percent by 2020, but prescribes no such targets itself.

Deadline: Negotiations for the next climate accord should last for two years and conclude in 2009 to allow enough time to implement it at the end of 2012. Four major climate meetings will take place next year.

Rich And Poor: Negotiators should consider binding reductions of gas emissions by industrialized countries, while developing countries should consider moves to control the growth of their emissions. Richer countries should work to transfer climate-friendly technology to poorer nations.

Adjusting To Climate Change: Negotiators should look at supporting urgent steps to help poorer countries adapt to effects of global warming, such as building sea walls to guard against rising oceans.

Deforestation: Negotiators should consider incentives for reducing deforestation in developing countries, many of which are seeking compensation for preserving forest "sinks" absorbing carbon dioxide.

The Associated Press

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT