UN climate talks to seek new deal December 12, 2011
9 December 2011
Last updated at 16:55 ET
This year’s UN climate talks look set for a long overrun as ministers try to narrow differences on a basic vision of how to tackle climate change.
The divide sees the EU and more than 70 of the world’s most climate-vulnerable nations in one camp, and big emitters, such as China and the US, in the other.
A draft text largely reflecting big emitters’ concerns was rejected.
The EU and its allies have pledged to walk away rather than accept an agreement they consider too weak.
This year’s meeting in South Africa is not intended to produce a new binding agreement.
But the EU, the Alliance of Small Island States (Aosis) and the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) bloc are seeking a firm roadmap towards such a deal, and soon.
Divided vision
The initial text, drawn up by the South African hosts, did not specify that the agreement must be legally binding, but did specify that its constraints must not start to bite until after 2020.
These lines reflected the positions of the BASIC group – Brazil, South Africa, India and China – and the US.
But the text was swiftly rejected by Dessima Williams, Grenada’s UN Ambassador.
Speaking on behalf of Aosis, she said it crossed several of their red lines.
“It doesn’t have enough ambition, the legal arrangements are ambiguous, and the time-frame doesn’t work for us.
“Most of the important ingredients are to take place after 2020, and that’s just not soon enough for us.”
One seasoned observer of the UN process said the proposals “buy 10 years’ delay in action for the US, China, India and Brazil, and risk making the most vulnerable countries ‘road kill’ on the big emitters’ highway to the future.”
Aosis produced its own draft text, asking for negotiations on the future legally binding agreement to begin early next year and conclude by the next UN climate meeting in December 2012.
It does not set a date for that agreement to come into force, but a date well before 2020 is implied by a recognition of the “significant gap” between the emission curbs countries have pledged and the cuts needed to keep the global temperature rise below 1.5C or 2C (2.7F or 3.6F).
It would also require governments to reduce fossil fuel subsidies, increase energy efficiency and slash emissions from international shipping and aviation.
The South Africans are working on a new text that will reportedly address the concerns of Aosis, the LDCs and the EU.
These groups have pledged they will not make an agreement here that is not consistent with the scientific picture.
“If there is no further movement, then I must say I don’t think there will be a deal in Durban,” said EU climate commissioner Connie Hedegaard.
UK Climate Minister Chris Huhne also said the bloc would rather leave Durban with no deal than one that was not based on science’s messages.
Finger pointing
India has been accused of being one of the main countries blocking a progressive deal here, along with China and the US.
Continue reading the main story
Adaptation
Action that helps cope with the effects of climate change – for example construction of barriers to protect against rising sea levels, or conversion to crops capable of surviving high temperatures and drought.
But India’s Environment Minister, Jayanthi Natarajan, said this was not the case.
She said her concern had been to understand what the EU “roadmap” to a new agreement involved.
“I don’t find myself at odds [with Aosis] at all, I think I share their concerns – they want quick action, we want quick action,” she told BBC News.
“The fact of the matter is there should be very quick action, and my very quick action is that want a review of what Annex One countries have done and we want to know how far they’ve gone, and I’m willing to listen to what Aosis says.”
She said the “firewall” marked in the UN climate process at its origin in 1992, which divided the world into Annex One – rich countries with commitments to reduce emissions – and everyone else, must be maintained.
Annex One states bore responsibility for their earlier greenhouse gas emissions, she said.
A number of observers suggested that of the BASIC bloc, Brazil and South Africa were minded to move towards the EU/LDCs/Aosis position – and if China did likewise, India and the US would then come under intense pressure to give ground.
Rising anger
The main lobby of the conference centre in Durban, South Africa, saw a long demonstration on the final afternoon, with campaigners demanding progress.
“Listen to the people, not the polluters,” they chanted.
The last of the demonstrators was led away about an hour-and-a-half later.
Greenpeace International executive director Kumi Naidoo was among those escorted from the conference centre for leading the protest.
“The United States delegation is right now organising, line-by-line, the means by which United Nations member states will be eradicated from the map,” he said.
“I ask the proud American people, in whose name this is being done, to take just a moment today to consider what they would do if they learned that a conference of powers was plotting to wipe their great nation off the map, because for low-lying islands that is the future they face.”
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Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/science-environment-16118909
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