As a hundred heads of state congregate in Copenhagen on Friday, the world’s attention will be fixed on the Danish capital. This is fitting, given that our planet’s climate is at stake.
Amid the declarations and speeches, however, it is important to remember that even the best possible Copenhagen outcome will be a waypoint, not an endpoint, and one that must lead to a legally binding climate agreement, concluded in 2010. Only a binding global agreement can assure fairness, and trigger carbon-cutting measures worldwide as countries gain assurance that all are acting in concert. Only a binding global agreement will level the playing field, unleashing business activity and innovation in support of a low carbon economy.
This is what politicians and negotiators must have in their minds as they lay the foundations for global action and financing to curb greenhouse gas emissions. The “political agreement” that emerges on December 18 must not substitute symbolism for commitment. We need the framework and a specific date by which a binding global agreement will be concluded.
That said, the prospects of making major progress at Copenhagen are better than they seemed only last month, and like night and day compared with the gloomy outlook that prevailed little more than a year ago.
In December 2007, in Bali, climate negotiators from 180 nations booed their U.S. counterparts into silence as frustration at George W. Bush’s non-leadership on climate change boiled over. Developing countries, meanwhile, emphatically rejected any suggestion that they should join industrialized countries in setting targets to reduce emissions. A year later, despite initial relief when President Obama stated his commitment to take action on climate change, progress bogged down. There was particular disappointment when U.S. negotiators insisted there would be no U.S. commitment to greenhouse gas reductions until Congress had approved cap-and-trade legislation and that, even then, early U.S. reductions would be less than scientists had urged.
In recent months the dynamic has changed. Key countries have reluctantly accepted Washington’s insistence that it cannot commit to a reduction target until the Congress has done so. Major developing countries with growing GHG emissions, including China, India, Brazil, Mexico, Indonesia, and South Africa, have announced quantitative and significant (though non-binding) commitments to reduce domestic emissions.
President Obama’s eleventh hour decision to attend the summit, and to commit the U.S. to reduce emissions “in the range of 17 percent”, evidences his own commitment to the issue. His presence, an explicit personal commitment to do all he can to secure legislation, and an acknowledgement that the United States must be a significant part of an effort by the industrialized world to help poor countries adapt to climate change’s impacts and accelerate low carbon development to reduce poverty while avoiding emissions, could do much to assure a positive outcome.
