The ins and outs of Malta's commitments

Quoting EU sources, the Swedish NGO Secretariat on Acid Rain states that even though Malta's share of renewable electricity generation in 1997 and 2002 was zero per cent, the target for 2010 is five per cent. This is comparable to the Cyprus target for 2010 set at six per cent, contrasting with 78.1 per cent for Austria and 60 per cent for Sweden. Environment and Rural Affairs Minister George Pullicino further confirmed Malta's 2010 five per cent target when he was addressing the United Nations Climate Change Conference held in Montreal, Canada, on December 8.

Bringing together the parties to the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change for their 11th meeting (hence the term COP11), the conference coincided with the entry into force of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. The latter international environmental agreement is often described as a milestone in humanity's attempts to mitigate the catastrophic impacts resulting from global warming and climate change.

In his book The Collapse Of The Kyoto Protocol And The Struggle To Slow Global Warming, David G. Victor expresses his scepticism about the Kyoto treaty. Mr Victor argues that the protocol was hurriedly negotiated with most of the agreement articles put together in the last few weeks before the final negotiating session in December 1997.

The Kyoto Protocol's main achievement is crystallised in Article 3 (1) of the agreement which stipulates that parties in Annex B of the protocol (the developed countries and transition economies, also referred to as Annex I countries with respect to the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the parent Convention) should curtail their greenhouse gas emissions (listed in Annex A) by at least five per cent below 1990 levels in the commitment period 2008 to 2012.

This bold target is counterbalanced by sub-article 2 of Article 3 which states that by 2005 parties to the protocol should have made demonstrable progress in achieving the commitments under the protocol. The agreement, however, does not clarify what "demonstrable progress" entails.

Even the relatively innovative element in Article 17 of the protocol, providing for tradable emission permit schemes, was met with widespread scepticism. Partitioning the atmosphere for the purposes of setting rigid greenhouse gas emission ceilings for different countries appeared a daunting task. The issue of trading in pollution allowances was considered even more far fetched.

The stated objective behind the 1992 UN Framework Convention also leaves much to be desired. Whereas the Convention stated that greenhouse gas levels should be stabilised at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system, it does not specify what this level might be.

The Framework Convention's timeframe for stabilising greenhouse gas emission levels - within a time frame sufficient to allow ecosystems to adapt naturally to climate change, to ensure that food production is not threatened and to enable economic development to proceed in a sustainable manner - is also ambiguous.

This style in the wording of international environmental agreements reflects nations' reluctance to comply with strict legal provisions which, though intended to safeguard the environment, may easily conflict with economic growth efforts.

Malta signed and ratified both the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. However, as a developing country, Malta's obligations under these treaties do not include the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions as with Annex B countries in the Kyoto agreement.

The European Union, then still comprising 15 member states, is another Kyoto protocol Annex B party and it is bound to reduce its emissions by eight per cent compared to 1990 levels within the 2008-2012 commitment period. The provisions of the protocol have been transposed into Directive 2003/87/EC (Emissions Trading Directive) establishing a scheme for greenhouse gas emission allowance trading within the union. The European Community Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Scheme Regulations were eventually transposed into Maltese law last May 17 through Legal Notice 140. In fact, at the Montreal Conference, Mr Pullicino argued that apart from fulfilling its obligations under the above-mentioned international treaties including the compiling of a National Greenhouse Gas Inventory, Malta is doing "even more than what it is expected under the Convention and the Protocol" by adhering to EU legal obligations to curb emissions.

Under Article 9 of Directive 2003/87/EC, EU member states are obliged to prepare National Allocation Plans listing the quantities of greenhouse gas emissions each state projects for specific periods. The first was a three-year period commencing on January 1, 2005 and running till the end of 2007.

Malta submitted its National Allocation Plan for this period on October 18, 2004, having the plan approved unaltered by Brussels on January 6, 2005.

The directive stipulates that a second National Allocation Plan should cover the subsequent five-year period commencing on January 1, 2008 and it is understood that this plan shall be published in the near future.

Mr Pulis teaches environmental science and chemistry at the Giovanni Curmi Higher Secondary School, in Naxxar.