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2009-12-14 07:47:20
OK, they're a long way short of constituting a final deal... but two draft
texts, drawn up by conference chairmen and released to delegates today,
demonstrate where compromises may have to be made if this fortnight is to
result in the deal that so many governments say they want.
globe_getty226.jpgThe chairmen of the Long-term Co-operative Action (LCA) and
Kyoto Protocol (KP) tracks have spent big chunks of the year listening to what
various parties want, out in the open and behind the scenes. So these texts are
the distillations of people in the know.
(If you don't know your LCA from your KP, see my previous post for something
that'll either clarify or further confuse.)
Developing countries have won two battles. Most importantly, the LCA text sets
out a level of emission cuts for the developed world that is beyond what
countries have so far pledged.
The minimum is a 25% cut from 1990 levels by 2020. According to the European
Climate Foundation's number-crunchers, the best that's on offer right now
amounts to about 18%.
This isn't developing countries demanding it, remember. This is what an
independent chair has assessed as an achievable meeting-point for all sides.
Breaking the numbers down further, it's also clear that when measured against
the traditional base year of 1990, the US is being asked to do less than the
rest of the developed world - a 15% cut by 2020 - whereas other rich countries
would have to find 30%.
The texts include a lot of gaps and a lot of places where the dreaded square
brackets exist side by side as alternative suggested outcomes, like this:
"...the increase in the global average temperature above pre-industrial levels
ought not to exceed [2C][1.5C]".
That one is a really fundamental divide.
1.5_595_ap.jpg
According to a UK Met Office analysis released earlier in the week, 1.5C is
barely achievable even with dramatic emissions cuts. But put that argument to
the poorer countries that are demanding it, and they say it's not their problem
- if the West had got on with cutting emissions 10 years ago when the Kyoto
Protocol was signed, and if tougher limits had followed, 1.5C would by now be
achievable; so deal with it.
Less fundamental, but with equal potential for controversy, are the alternative
versions of text that would either prevent or allow money from the Kyoto
Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism from being used on nuclear reactors... a
clean technology for some, exactly the opposite for others.
What else is contentious? Developing country emission curbs wouldn't be legally
binding, which is an issue for some, and there is very little on international
monitoring and verification of emission curbs, which China especially is said
to be dead set against. And there is precious little text on finance.
Talking of finance; the other big news around the centre today blew in from
Brussels, where EU leaders finally decided how much they would put on the table
for the next three years to "quick-start" emissions reduction and climate
adaptation in the poorest and most climate-vulnerable countries.
EU leaders exuded satisfaction that they'd produced something that will seal a
deal here. But when countries that are supposed to be signing that deal partly
on the basis of how much money they'll receive describe it as "woefully
inadequate", as the Association of Small Island States (Aosis) leader Dessima
Williams did, you have to wonder.
stern595_getty.jpg
There is a strand of opinion here (there are many others too, to be fair) that
holds that the EU and the world's major powers approached this summit a little
too much like a private deal. If they could agree among themselves, the rest of
the world would follow.
And maybe it will. Most countries now are sending heads of government or heads
of state for the final day or two, and of course most of them can change tack
in an instant if the right incentives are offered.
Or maybe it won't. Maybe this is the occasion when the developing world, or
parts of it at any rate, says "no more" - as it has with the Doha Round of
trade talks.
During the week ahead when the weather is forecast to be even colder and more
gloomy than it has been so far, temperatures inside the centre look set to soar
as the climax approaches - a textbook case of localised warming.