Archive for September, 2009

A general scaling-down of ambition in tackling global heating is taking place ahead of the COP-15 – the Fifteenth Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, in Copenhagen in December.

First, it seems clear that the European Commission has, under pressure from member states, moderated its plans on financial assistance to developing countries to help them deal with climate change. The Commission first published proposals in January for total assistance to developing countries of €175 billion annually by 2020, but this had by yesterday (Sept. 10) been reduced to around €100 billion, of which up to 40 percent could be from the poorest countries themselves, while the largest emerging economies such as China and India will also be required to chip in, based on their share of world GDP.

Green MEPs strongly criticised the revised plans, but the British and German governments put out statements saying the Commission had got it about right, so it seems fairly clear where the pressure came from to cut the financial pledges back.

The centre-right Swedes, meanwhile, seem to be taking a highly politically-pragmatic view. Swedish environment minister Andreas Carlgren, who will be a key negotiator in Copenhagen, has all but dropped mention of mid-term targets (ie greenhouse gas cuts to be achieved by 2020), speaking instead about “credible pathways” towards longer-term goals. This falls in to line with the US, who so far are happy to make promises to be achieved by succeeding generations (ie. goals for 2050), but who will only envisage very moderate cuts in the medium term.

Todd Stern, the US special envoy for climate change, stated clearly the American position yesterday (Sept. 10), in front of a House of Representatives committee. He suggested US negotiators at Copenhagen will stick to the mid-term cuts outlined in draft US legislation – cutting US emissions by 17 percent by 2020 from 2005 levels, or by around four percent relative to 1990 levels. Stern said he was working on “imparting a sense of reality” to the EU and others who want steeper cuts. “They are not going to get more than that [what is on the table at the moment from the US], so let’s get real,” he said.

He also said that any deal at Copenhagen must “combine a sense of what science says is required” with “a sense of pragmatism” – a strange statement seeming to mean “we will look at what science says is necessary, then do less.” What will prove right in the end, I wonder, political pragmatism, or scientific facts?

Or as Lemmy from Motorhead once said, “I don’t understand people who believe that if you ignore something it will go away. That’s completely wrong – if it’s ignored, it gathers strength. Europe ignored Hitler for years…as a result he slaughtered quarter of the world!”