New U.N. Climate Deal: Not Much Bolder Than Kyoto?

Date added: 9 May, 2009

9.5.2009   (Reuters – Climate Ark)

Author: Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent – Analysis

OSLO – A planned new U.N. climate pact is shaping up to be a mildly tougher version
of the existing Kyoto Protocol rather than a bold treaty to save what U.S. President
Barack Obama has called a “planet in peril.”

“There’s not a lot of ambition around,” said Jennifer Morgan, of the London-based
think-tank E3G, of submissions to the United Nations published this month to meet
a deadline for consideration in a deal to be agreed in Copenhagen in December.

Australia is a partial exception, saying on Monday that it would ratchet up planned
cuts by 2020, if other nations also did so.  But Canberra put back its planned carbon emissions trading scheme by a year to mid-2011,
amid a recession.

Taking account of the new Australian offer, plans outlined by developed nations add up to average cuts in greenhouse
gas emissions of between 9 and 16% below 1990 levels by 2020, according to Reuters calculations.

That is nearer the goal of the Kyoto Protocol — an average cut by industrialized
nations of 5 % below 1990 levels by 2008-12 — than the 25 to 40% reduction below 1990 by 2020 outlined by the U.N. Climate Panel as
the order of cutback required to avert the worst of global warming.

“The economic downturn is putting a brake on the level of commitment and investment
to mitigate climate change,” said Pep Canadell, head of the global carbon project
at Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization.

He said Australia’s delay was a sign of economic strains.

BUDGET DEFICITS

“The current stimulus packages are committing the economies of developed countries
to run deficits for a number of years which will not make things easier in the
near future either,” he said.

And the rich nations’ plans contrast starkly with demands by developing nations,
which are likely to suffer most from projected floods, droughts, extinctions of
plants and animals and rising sea levels caused by global warming.

Countries such as China and India want the rich to cut by at least 40% below 1990 levels by 2020 as a condition for their greater involvement in curbing rising emissions. They
also want aid and green technology — submissions so far have been vague about
cash.

Among developed nations, the European Union says cuts must ensure that world
temperatures do not rise more than 2 Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) above levels that
existed before the Industrial Revolution.

“Submissions so far from all countries are nowhere near 2 Celsius,” said Bill
Hare, a visiting scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research
and a director of Climate Analytics.

“Many countries are slumbering through the climate crisis like Sleeping Beauty,”
Norwegian Environment Minister Erik Solheim said, asked about the gap between
the rich nations’ offers and the expectations of developing nations.

Norway has so far promised some of the deepest cuts — 30% below 1990 levels by 2020.   But some of the cuts will be made by buying carbon emissions quotas abroad, funded by cash from North Sea oil, rather than by reducing emissions at home.

Fossil fuels are a main source of greenhouse gases.

Obama plans to cut U.S. emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, a cut of about 14%   from 2007 levels, to help what he described in his election victory speech last November as a
“planet in peril.”    He wants cuts of 80 percent by 2050.

Washington says that it needs to be guided by pragmatism as well as by climate science — and says the 25 to 40% range is far out of reach
for 2020.     But Obama’s more modest goal may be having a knock-on effect.

“Even going back to 1990 levels in the U.S. — which is far from insignificant
— has just made Japan feel more at ease that it doesn’t need to go any further,”
said Kim Carstensen, head of the Global Climate Initiative of the WWF International
environmental group.

“My sense is that we have seen the same relaxation in Europe…Australia may
be the point where we begin to see a change,” he said.

Australia said it will cut by up to 25 % below 2000 levels if other nations join
in, toughening its earlier plan to cut by 5 to 15%.    Japan has yet to set a 2020
goal, from widely varying options. The EU has promised a cut of 20% by 2020 from
1990, and up to 30% if other nations join in.

(Editing by Mark Trevelyan)

http://planetark.org/wen/52774

Posted: Saturday, May 9th, 2009. Filed in Climate Change News.