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CLIMATE CHANGE: The Kyoto Deal Is Changing Too

Sanjay Suri

LONDON, Nov 5 2005 (IPS) - Like U.S. President George W. Bush, more and more leaders now hear ‘money’ and ‘markets’ when they hear ‘climate change’. And they could be going the Bush way rather than bring Bush the other way around.

Within the United States some states are introducing emission permit systems along the lines of emissions trading proposed under the Kyoto protocol, and under way in the European Union. But Americans could find several world leaders now joining the leader they are now turning their backs on.

Further signs of that were evident at a conference of environment ministers and other representatives from 20 countries at a conference called by the British government in London Tuesday and Wednesday this week.

No outcome to the meeting was announced. ”But what we are hearing in terms of the outcome from the London meeting so far are that there’s a significant shift away from commitment to targets,” Dr Camilla Toulmin, director of the International Institute for Environment and Development told IPS.

”Evidently Prime Minister Blair feels that targets and legally binding commitments frighten people away and they then feel nervous so that they want to go instead on much greater emphasis like technological development,” she said.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair said after the meeting that industry was getting ”very nervous and very worried” about specific frameworks and targets.

”People fear some external force is going to impose some internal target on you which is going to restrict your economic growth,” he said. ”I think in the world after 2012 we need to find a better, more sensitive set of mechanisms to deal with this problem.”

That might just mean a push towards the end of the Kyoto protocol. Under that protocol agreed in Kyoto in Japan in 1997, the industrialised countries would cut emissions by at least 5.2 percent over the first implementation period 2008-2012 relative to 1990 levels. Developing countries such as India and China are exempt under Kyoto from introducing new technology to cut emissions.

The basis of that exclusion was that industrialised countries are responsible for the bulk of the pollution, and they must cut emissions first. The Chinese and Indian governments also claim that emissions from their countries per capita are miniscule compared to emissions from industrialised countries. But Blair has argued that the cumulative emissions from these countries are growing massively with expanding industry, and that these countries too need to be roped into any post- Kyoto commitment beyond 2012.

The governments of India and China support the Kyoto protocol, but not if they are bound by it into targets and commitments to cut emissions. The new technology needed to cut emissions comes at a cost, and everyone is afraid it can raise the price of their goods to uncompetitive levels in the international market.

”I think there’s a strong worry about the economic power and competition posed by both China and India,” Toulmin said. ”A consequence of that is that people in UK, in Europe, in North America seem to be cutting back on environmental and other regulations because they think this will damage their capacity to compete effectively with India and China and that’s one of the reasons we’re seeing a move away from tighter regulations to much more what is thought to be a business friendly environment.”

This might well be an unfounded fear, she said. ”The interesting thing is that a lot of business in the UK and Europe are seeking tighter regulation. They want the government to tell them what the framework will be, so that they can plan. They need to be able to plan for the next five, ten, 15 years, and to know what the government has in mind.”

The London conference was held in advance of the United Nations climate change conference to be held in Montreal in Canada Nov. 28 to Dec. 9. No particular agreements emerged from the meeting.

”It was 20 countries talking together about clean technology, the scope of technology in delivering emissions reductions,” Catherine Pearce from Friends of the Earth told IPS. ”No commitments, no timetable, no targets. That was the basis of the dialogue announced at the G8 summit. It’s great to see the likes of China, India, the United States talking about what the potential is for emissions, renewables in terms of reducing carbon emissions.”

The London talks were never intended to ”pose any sort of parallel process to the formal UN negotiations,” Pearce said. They are a part of an initiative by Blair at the G8 (group of eight industrialised countries comprising the United States, Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Russia) in Scotland in July that would either draw India, China and other emerging industrialised economies into commitments, or take the industrialised countries out of them post-2012.

”We don’t actually know what happens after 2012 when the first commitment period ends, and of course everyone is looking to the likes of China and India to see how to involve these countries in future commitments,” Pearce said. ”I think the industrialised countries, the G8 countries, have a great deal to do in these countries in terms of helping finance new technology.”

A move away from commitments would be ultimately damaging, Toulmin said. ”In the short term that probably is good news because it means there won’t be any tight targets to face up to in the next few years. In the medium to long term it’s bad news for everybody because climate change is one of those global problems, global responsibilities for which we need joined up, collective action.”

The initiative would have to come from the developed world, she said. ”We’ve got to cap carbon emissions, and fairly shortly if we’re not to face even more dangerous climate change. If we’re asking India and China to cap carbon emissions, then I think we in the rich world also have a responsibility to help make that happen. So various kinds of financial measures are needed in order to develop the technologies that allow growth, but within the context of a low carbon economy.”