By Joydeep Gupta, IANS
Bali : The main goal of the Dec 3-14 UN conference on climate change here is to begin negotiations for a new international climate change agreement that will kick in by the end of 2012 when the current agreement under the Kyoto Protocol comes to an end. While that is expected to happen, the devils in the detail will remain.
Executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Yvo de Boer said: “The Bali conference will not deliver a fully negotiated and agreed climate deal but is aimed to set the necessary wheels in motion.
“Parties need to agree on the key areas which the new climate agreement should cover, such as mitigation – including avoided deforestation – adaptation, technology and financing.
“They also need to agree on when the talks and negotiations will conclude so that the new climate change deal can be ratified by national governments before the end of 2012.”
In 2005, all the 192 countries that are party to the framework convention started what is called the “dialogue on long-term cooperative action to address climate change by enhancing implementation of the convention”.
After four meetings, the results of the dialogue were submitted on the opening day of the Bali summit, which is being attended by over 10,000 delegates from 187 countries.
Now the question is, will the talks for a post-2012 deal continue in this dialogue format or move to formal negotiations or be a combination of the two.
Chandrashekhar Dasgupta, senior member of the Indian government delegation at the summit, told IANS: “It is essential to conclude negotiations for emissions reductions by industrialised countries for the second commitment period (after 2012).”
Governments of some industrialised countries such as the US, Canada and Japan are not in favour of formal negotiations because that would force them to commit to legally binding reductions in emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) that warm the atmosphere.
The US, of course, did not sign the Kyoto Protocol. But even the industrialised countries that did so are not sure if they will be able to stick to their commitments during the period 2008 to 2012. In this situation, many are wary of committing deeper cuts after 2012.
This is why many industrialised countries have been pushing China and India to also make legally binding commitments to reduce GHG emissions.
The Chinese government has cleverly refused to be baited by this demand, pointing out that China already has a national plan to control GHG emissions and making a vague promise to go further if it receives enough international cooperation.
Talking about the demand being made on India, de Boer said: “In a country where 400 million people do not have access to electricity, it does not make any sense to ask for emission reductions.”
While that is incontrovertible, India would have been able to deflect criticism better if it had been more vocal about the steps it has already taken to reduce its GHG emissions.
But whether through dialogue or formal negotiations or both, industrialised countries know that they will have to make commitments for the post-2012 period. They also know that negotiations will have to be completed by 2009 for countries to ratify the agreement in their parliaments well before end 2012.
Thanks largely to this year’s report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), now everyone recognises climate change is here, that it is already having major adverse impacts on development, and that the situation is going to worsen drastically unless urgent steps are taken.
The 176 countries that signed the Kyoto Protocol have agreed that the urgent steps needed to address climate change “would entail emissions reductions in the range of 25-40 percent below 1990 levels by industrialised countries”, according to the UNFCCC.
After three years of wrangling on who is to administer it, this summit may finally see the start of a fund to help developing countries adapt to climate change. But the money available for it now – $36 million – is nothing compared to what is needed.
There is also the vexed question of who is to help developing countries pay for greener technology that will reduce their GHG emissions. There is a special fund that is mandated to do this. But its current pledges – $67 million by June – will not be enough. Industrialised countries don’t even want to talk about giving more money, while de Boer hopes the money will come from the private sector.
One of the major accomplishments of the UNFCCC has been the establishment of the carbon market, and this summit is examining if a new technology – capturing the carbon dioxide (the main GHG) emitted through industrial processes and storing it underground – can be added to it. A decision is expected next year.
The bureaucrats will continue wrangling over each of these issues Monday and Tuesday, and then hand over remaining disagreements to their political masters.
“Too many issues will slip into this high-level segment” of the summit, said a worried de Boer. That will give the politicians a chance to demonstrate their statesmanship – or otherwise.