UN Climate Conference adopts 'Road Map'

UN climate conference in Bali adopted a plan to negotiate a new global warming deal. Approval for the UN Adaptation Fund was a key part of the agreement.

Targets wot Targets?
The main battle was between Europe and the U.S. over whether the document should mention specific goals for rich countries' obligations to cut greenhouse gas emissions. The EU's proposal was for a goal for cutting the emissions of industrial nations by 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 (following IPCC Report recommendations). This ended up as a footnote reference to the IPCC Report.

There are no specific commitments or figures on the emissions reductions that developed countries will need to take. There is just talk that "deep cuts will be needed". The agreement was to hold further talks to be completed in 2009. These may help determine for years to come how well the world can control climate change, and how severe the consequences of global warming will be.

The broadly worded "roadmap" doesn't itself guarantee any level of emissions reductions or any international commitment by any country - only a commitment to negotiate.

Head of the U.S. delegation said: "We will go forward and join consensus."

"The U.S. needed to come in here and build up its credibility," says Kevin Knobloch, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists. "Instead, they just burnished their Darth Vader image."

Saturday Snag

The negotiations snagged again early Saturday over demands by developing nations that their need for technological help from rich nations and other issues receive greater recognition in the document launching the negotiations. The United States initially rejected those demands, but backed down after delegates criticized the U.S. stand and urged a reconsideration.

The final document instructs negotiators for developing countries to consider incentives and other means to encourage poorer nations to curb, on a voluntary basis, growth in their emissions. The explosive growth of greenhouse emissions in China, India and other developing countries potentially could negate cutbacks in the developed world.

"The developing nations of the South are on the same road as the North," says Peter Goldmark, director for the climate and air program for Environmental Defense. "They're using the same roadmap." The clear big winners are China and India, which have fully arrived as major players on international climate action.

Beyond

The Bali conference had been charged with launching negotiations for a regime of deeper emissions reductions to succeed the Kyoto Protocol.

The Bush administration favours a voluntary approach — each country deciding how it can contribute — in place of internationally negotiated and legally binding commitments. Many people are resigned to waiting for a change in White House leadership after next November's election.

"The United States in particular is behaving like passengers in first class in a jumbo jet, thinking a catastrophe in economy class won't affect them," said Tony Juniper, a spokesman for a coalition of environmentalists at the conference. "If we go down, we go down together, and the United States needs to realize that very quickly."

The Bali roadmap's most substantial achievement is to put forestry at the front for future climate change negotiations. Deforestation accounts for up to 20% of "manmade" global warming emissions, but the Kyoto Protocol has no mechanism to support the protection of forests. That will change, and eventually tropical nations could be rewarded for not cutting down their forests, providing a way to reduce carbon emissions. The Global Environment Facility said it plans to launch the Tropical Forest Account Initiative which will help safeguard forest ecosystems.

The size limit for small-scale reforestation projects will be doubled to 16 kilotonnes of carbon dioxide per year, to enable more projects to qualify for the UN clean development mechanism (CDM) and allow many more countries to take part.

What happened to “global sectoral agreements”?

These global sectoral agreements are aimed at the leading companies in certain sectors to meet and agree on targets to cut their carbon dioxide emissions. For more 'Emissions deal aimed at key sectors'.

Climate change talks have stalled for years because many countries – both developed and developing – have been unwilling to agree to emissions curbs unless they are universally adopted, fearing their industries would suffer competitive disadvantage against those in countries that had not agreed to cuts.

Global sectoral agreements on emissions avoid this difficulty by committing the biggest companies in a given sector to cut their emissions by similar amounts to their peers, erasing any competitive disadvantage. Many industries are in favour of such agreements, viewing them as preferable to alternatives such as a patchwork of emissions regulations across the world

Setting up such agreements was one of the least contentious items in the discussions at Bali, so does anybody know what happened to them at Bali? We are checking with World Business Council who were backing them.to find out whether they were adopted.

Produced by Environmental Practice at Work Publishing Company Ltd. Copyright 2007