Divergent views among ICAO member states leaves substantive MBM agreement by 2013 hanging in the balance
Officials from 17 countries are working with ICAO to shape an agreement acceptable to its 191 member countries to reduce aviation’s carbon footprint through market based measures (MBMs). ICAO needs to agree on progress by its September Assembly meeting. Progress has been glacially slow over the past decade, and there appears to be no real progress now. A high-level group (HGCC) of senior officials and negotiators was set up last November to accelerate discussions and find compromises between states on MBMs, but its process has now ended. It appears that very little progress had been made and there were significant diverging views. GreenAir reports that Russia’s representative firmly rejected MBMs and even called for a reassessment of ICAO’s 2% annual fuel efficiency goal. Some ICAO representatives remained mildly optimistic that some form of an agreement could be reached by ICAO Assembly by September, with further progress towards a global scheme being achieved by 2016. It appears a number of differences between ICAO member states in key areas have not been resolved by the HGCC and time is running out for full consensus by the September Assembly – realistically it seems unlikely..
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Divergent views among ICAO member states leaves substantive MBM agreement by 2013 hanging in the balance
24.5.2013 (GreenAir online)
A very comprehensive and thorough article – some extracts below – full article at http://www.greenaironline.com/news.php?viewStory=1694
Two conferences in Montreal last week provided an opportunity for ICAO Council members to publicly explain their respective country’s position on current attempts to form an agreement on the application of market-based measures (MBMs) to limit the growth of international aviation carbon emissions.
With the high-level group process now formally ended, Australia’s representative on the Council and Chair of the Council’s Air Transport Committee, Kerryn Macaulay, told delegates at the industry’s Air Transport Action Group (ATAG) Workshop that very little progress had been made and there were significant diverging views.
At the subsequent ICAO Aviation and Climate Change Symposium, Russia’s representative firmly rejected MBMs and even called for a reassessment of ICAO’s 2% annual fuel efficiency goal.
Other speakers, however, stated their optimism that some form of an agreement could be reached by the ICAO Assembly this coming autumn with further progress towards a global scheme being achieved by 2016.
Following a Council meeting last November, a decision was taken to establish the climate change high-level group (HGCC) of senior officials and negotiators to accelerate discussions and find compromises between states on MBMs.
This was seen by the EU as a positive enough development to allow it to temporarily suspend the application of its emissions scheme to intercontinental flights to and from Europe.
However, it appears a number of differences between ICAO member states in key areas have not been resolved by the HGCC and time is running out for full consensus by the time of the Assembly.
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(Macaulay) …told delegates at the ATAG Workshop there were three main areas where opinions on the application of MBMs differed:
- Geographic scope – a number of governments have sensitivities over the sovereignty issue;
- Who the participants should be; and
- Addressing the ‘special circumstances and respective capabilities’ of developing states principle.
Macaulay said a report from the HGCC and an amended version of the draft resolution would be discussed at the next meeting of the Air Transport Committee slated for June 4. She said the meeting would attempt to find more common ground, reduce the number of square brackets and make recommendations to the Council for its meeting at the end of June, but described her Committee role on the issue as “chief herder of cats”.
She was not optimistic that many of the differing views would be narrowed down by the conclusion of the Council meeting but, she said, “we will work on the resolution right up to the start of the Assembly if need be.”
Cautioned Macaulay: “It is possible the resolution may go to the Assembly with not all the elements settled.”
As no further meetings have been scheduled, the future of the HGCC was uncertain, she said, and depended on guidance from the ICAO Council President and the views of the Council itself.
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A global MBM was but one of a host of measures, said Elina Bardram, Head of the Aviation and Maritime Unit, International Carbon Markets, at the European Commission. “We would like nothing more than for MBMs to become obsolete but this won’t happen without breakthrough technologies – that is just the reality,” she told delegates. “Also, these technologies may not be economically viable for the industry. MBMs do offer a flexible and effective mechanism for industry to contribute without compromising growth. That’s the beauty of an MBM and that’s why the EU introduced its emissions trading scheme.”
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The full, very comprehensive, article from GreenAir online is at http://www.greenaironline.com/news.php?viewStory=1694
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Aviation officials see global emissions deal possible by 2020
http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/05/21/airlines-emissions-idINDEE94K0ET20130521
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More news about the EU Emissions Trading System at EU ETS News Stories
See earlier:
The clock has stopped on aviation’s inclusion in the ETS: but where is ICAO now?
May 2, 2013 Following the European Parliament’s vote approving the Commission’s proposal to “Stop the Clock”, Conservative MEP Peter Liese, aviation EU ETS and “Stop the Clock” Rapporteur, hosted a public briefing for MEPs in Brussels on 24th April to review progress of the ICAO High Level Group on Climate Change (HGCC) formation. The conference was attended by Jos Delbeke (Director–General DG Clima), Prof David Lee (Manchester University), IATA’s Paul Steele and Green MEP Satu Hassi. T&E have written a report on the meeting. Unless things changed, and ICAO made rapid progress leading to a constructive agreement on both the need for a global market-based mechanism (MBM) to address international aviation emissions and for a Framework to govern national/regional schemes such as the EU ETS , then the original aviation Directive would “snap back” automatically next January. The Directive wouldn’t be amended “because of pressure from China, the US or Airbus”. Jos Delbeke insisted that if the whole problem couldn’t be solved now it couldn’t be solved later and, consequently, the credibility of ICAO’s global goals was squarely on the table. Click here to view full story…
ICAO looks like wasting EU’s gesture
April 28, 2013 (Transport & Environment)
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