Copenhagen Talks End with Beginnings of a Global Pact

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19 December 2009 :: Eva Scherson

After two weeks of intense and sometimes bitter negotiations, US president Barack Obama arrived in Copenhagen to marshal all his diplomatic skills in brokering the beginnings of a viable framework for global carbon emissions reductions. Late Friday, it was announced that five nations —the United States, China, India, Brazil, and South Africa— had carved out a deal that would, for the first time, bring all the world’s major economies into the same camp on efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

The United Nations had failed to produce a climate pact that would establish binding international law on emissions reductions, so the five-nation deal can only be a beginning. Pres. Obama himself, addressing the press, said “This progress did not come easily and we know this progress alone is not enough”, but he also heralded the agreement as “meaningful”. While the agreement contains no legally binding measures, it sets the world on a course where the leading emitters of carbon dioxide —China and the United States— agree they must take steps to reduce emissions far enough that global average temperatures will not rise more than 2ºC above pre-industrial levels.

The rest of the world now needs to support the measure, and there has been stiff opposition. Sudan, Nicaragua, Cuba, Venezuela and Bolivia, nearly brought the talks to collapse, during a heated negotiating session overnight, as they denounced the accord as everything from a violation of the UN’s principle of unanimity to a neo-imperialist conspiracy. The government of the Maldives, however, a nation faced with extinction beneath rising seas, urged all nations to support the accord.

China’s Communist leadership and the United States’ Republican party should both be happy with the final language, which takes into account concerns about the possible erosion of national sovereignty under enforceable emissions reductions protocols. But there is clearly some outrage at the degree to which China’s refusal to allow for international transparency or legal enforceability undermined the potential for a binding Copenhagen protocol on steep emissions reductions.

The Copenhagen Accord will allow, in the short term, for individual nations to craft entirely unique strategies for meeting unspecified emissions reduction targets. The US plans to cut emissions by 20% by the year 2020 and by 83% by the year 2050, while Russia plans a 40% increase in its energy efficiency, an effort to modernize its infrastructure and also reduce overall carbon dioxide output. China has not specified an emissions-cutting target and it is feared the world’s leading emitter of CO2 will ramp up its emissions as new coal-fired plants come online, before enacting any tough emissions cutting measures.

The accord will also set a deadline for the end of January 2010 —just over a month from now— for nations to submit voluntary emissions cutting guidelines, while an alternate text also sets an end of December 2010 deadline for nations to report back on progress made in implementing specific emissions cutting strategies. EU nations expressed concern that the accord does not include language regarding a binding global target of 50% cuts in carbon emissions by the year 2050.

National Public Radio (NPR) is now reporting:

Following an all-night session, negotiators from 193 countries reached consensus on supporting a deal brokered yesterday by President Obama and leaders from China, India, South Africa and Brazil. The five-party agreement — three pages of broad brushstrokes — was criticized by the industrialized nations of Europe and bitterly denounced by some developing nations of Africa and Asia. Still, the gathered world leaders reluctantly agreed to continue the global effort to limit the effects of human-caused carbon emissions on the world’s climate.

Key components of the core five-nation deal call for keeping temperatures from rising by more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2050; creating a $100 billion per year fund by 2020 to help poor nations deal with the effects of climate change; and establishing some means of verifying if nations are doing their part to hold down carbon emissions.

Despite pointed criticisms of the deal, French president Nicolas Sarkozy said all nations agreed to the non-binding accord. The government of the Philippines spoke out in support of the deal, though it noted criticism of the deal for being too weak on concrete steps to limit overall greenhouse gas emissions. The Philippines is among the island nations seeking a binding legal framework that will force the world’s leading polluters, China, the United States, and other industrialized nations, to sharply reduce overall emissions in the near term.

Pres. Macapagal Arroyo noted in her address that “The average world per capita CO2 equivalent emission is 6 tons and must be brought down to 3 tons to stabilize at 450 ppm in 2050. The Philippines is already doing better than that. Our emissions are only 1.6 tons per capita and we are committed to further deviate from our business-as-usual growth path.” She also noted that the Philippines is officially recognized as one of the 12 most vulnerable nations facing severe impact from climate destabilization.