Kyoto Protocol up for debate in Durban?

Time is running out on the landmark greenhouse gas reduction measure, the Kyoto Protocol. The United Nations is meeting in Durban, South Africa to discuss the future of climate change and the future of the protocol. From the Guardian, here are some highlight of the discussions.

About the Kyoto Protocol

The Kyoto Protocol is an international agreement linked to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The major feature of the Kyoto Protocol is that it sets binding targets for 37 industrialized countries and the European community for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions .

Recognizing that developed countries are principally responsible for the current high levels of GHG emissions in the atmosphere as a result of more than 150 years of industrial activity, the Protocol places a heavier burden on developed nations under the principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities.”
The Kyoto Protocol was adopted in Kyoto, Japan, on 11 December 1997 and entered into force on 16 February 2005.

The future of the protocol

Kyoto’s first commitment period finishes at the end of 2012, and the question of whether governments will sign up to a second commitment period is seen by many as the linchpin of the negotiations. Allowing Kyoto to lapse would be a very, very bad idea for several reasons:

1) It’s the only binding international climate law we’ve got, with no alternative in sight. Without a legally binding agreement, we are left with vague intentions and no guarantees of success. Like allowing a kid to choose how much homework he really needs to do, the net result would ultimately amount to precious little, I suspect.

2) It’s working. The US is the only major industrialised country which did not ratify Kyoto. Collectively, developed countries that ratified Kyoto are on track to achieve the protocol’s target of an average decrease in emissions of 5.2% below 1990 levels between 2008 and 2012. Kyoto has triggered the enactment of national legislation in the majority of OECD countries, including the EU’s landmark “20-20-20″ targets. The United States, in stark contrast, saw its emissions rise by an estimated 11% in the same period.

3) It is helping drive the growth of the renewables industry in Europe and in big developing countries that are covered indirectly by Kyoto’s carbon markets. 65% of the projects stemming from Kyoto’s clean development mechanism, which allows countries to reduce emissions by investing in projects in developing countries, are focused on renewables. While countries could establish an international carbon-trading market even in the absence of Kyoto, it would have to be governed by basic, commonly agreed rules to ensure projects were genuinely climate-friendly. Kyoto has such rules (representing more than a decade of effort), markets are up and running and those that break the rules are brought to account – why not build on these rather than start over from scratch?

4) It’s fair (though it would be far fairer if the US had signed on). Kyoto’s first commitment period put the onus of first action on the highest and richest historical emitters. While the US whines about large developing countries such as China not being directly covered by Kyoto, it’s worth remembering that the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is a cumulative process, and cumulatively (1900-2007) the EU and the US together were responsible for nearly 54% of the energy-related emissions. China? Just over 9%. It’s even more enlightening to factor in the size of the population: the US emitted 1,093 metric tonnes per capita; the EU 572, and China a mere 80.

5) It represents collective action: Kyoto has an “aggregate” goal – the total of what individual country targets must add up to. This is the opposite of the bottom up, pledge approach now championed by the Obama Administration. The relatively short-term five-year commitment periods allow those goals to be ratcheted up as new information becomes available.

If Kyoto’s future dies in Durban, it may well be the death knell for an effective, comprehensive, internationally co-ordinated legal response to global climate change in this decade. We can’t afford to let that happen.

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