The climate talks in Durban that finished last weekend are being hailed as ?breakthrough??a word used in the official statement on Sunday from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change or UNFCCC.
Justified or not? Well, the reaction in the markets was distinctly damp, with carbon prices actually falling significantly on Monday morning.
The optimists gave as their first reason for claiming success at Durban the fact that the divide between the developed and developing countries in the emissions-control arena has narrowed and may soon close altogether.
Developing countries led by China and India pledged to work towards an agreement ?with legal force? to limit their fossil fuel emissions for the first time. This agreement would be finalised no later than 2020, parties at the conference agreed.
Since this satisfied the ?roadmap? requirement of the 27-nation European Union, the latter vowed to extend its emission reduction goals under the Kyoto Protocol beyond 2012. The EU already has its own internal target of lowering greenhouse gases by 20% below 1990 levels by 2020 and has said it may move to 30% if other countries follow suit. It is due to submit its new Kyoto goal by May 1, 2012.
Interestingly, Denmark, which has called for more ambitious climate goals, takes over the rotating presidency of the bloc in January.
The US, which has not ratified the Kyoto pact, also came on board with President Barack Obama?s envoy approving the accord in Durban. ?The Durban climate talks have brought us to an important moment where all nations will be covered in the same roadmap toward a long-term solution for the climate crisis?the greatest challenge facing our planet,? House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said in a statement.
The Durban meeting also adopted an instrument governing a ?Green Climate Fund?, which is aimed at helping channel as much as $100 billion a year by 2020 to developing nations. It is not clear where the money will come from or when. Technology transfer to developing nations and establishment of guidelines and procedures for nations reporting their greenhouse gas emissions to the United Nations were some of the other issues taken up at the meeting.
It was also decided to hold the next climate change conference at Qatar, starting from November 26 and lasting till December 7. In terms of global per capita emissions, the Middle East countries occupy four of the top five slots. Qatar had the highest per capita emissions for any country in the world in 2009. United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Bahrain figure among the top five. Iran was the seventh largest while Saudi Arabia was the tenth largest.
Separately, the International Maritime Organisation said it would consider how to set a price on emissions from ships next year. It will decide whether to impose a global levy or establish an emissions trading programme. And Japan said it may introduce a carbon tax to curb emissions as the use of fossil fuels to generate power increases in the once nuclear-
power-intensive country.
Areas of concern
As the clean energy sector has learned only too clearly over the years however, there is a big difference between US agreement at talks, and the actual delivery of US legislation. The deal at Durban involves legal commitments due to come into force several years into the future at best, and in the meantime the danger of climate change is likely to escalate.
Three countries?Canada, Japan and Russia?have decided against extending their Kyoto commitments. There are no new binding targets as of now resulting from the Durban deal. In fact, there may be no new pledges until 2020?the deadline year for the next pact.
That is worrisome, given that a report of the United Nations Environment Programme released last month said that pledges to curb emissions need to be doubled to contain global warming to the targeted two degrees centigrade. Current targets would at most slash six gigatonnes from the predicted 56 gigatonnes of carbon-dioxide-equivalent emissions in 2020. A drop to 44 gigatonnes is needed to meet the goal of two degrees centigrade, it said.
In the backdrop of all the challenges in meeting that target, there is also a case for applauding the progress which has been achieved outside the United Nations dialogue framework. Clean energy investment crossed $240bn last year from about a fifth of that in 2004. ?The good news is that the world is not waiting for a binding international deal in order to start addressing climate change,? said Michael Liebreich, the chief executive of Bloomberg New Energy Finance, citing the renewable energy programmes and targets of individual countries and cities.
The author is Editor, South Asia for Bloomberg New Energy Finance (www.bnef.com), a leading provider of independent analysis, data and news in the clean energy and carbon markets, headquartered in the UK
