COP21, the twenty-first Conference of the Parties to the 1992 Climate Change Convention, is scheduled to meet in Paris in the coming weeks. The event brings together representatives from about 190 countries with the historic task to distil what presently stands as a legal draft the articles of which are still subject to deliberation under various options into a new international climate agreement vital to secure a safer world.
The new agreement shall supersede the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, the greenhouse gas emissions reduction commitment period of which had been extended into a second phase lasting until 2020. By then, the global community should be in a position to feel reassured that once the mechanisms of the new Paris climate agreement enter into force the world will be well on course to safeguard itself and especially future generations from the perils of global temperature rise beyond 20C compared to pre-industrial.
With the Industrial Revolution in full swing, it was in 1896 when the Swedish scientist Svante Arrhenius proposed that carbon dioxide increases in Earth’s atmosphere resulting from fossil fuel burning could lead to global temperature rise. The scientific advances of the 20th century led to a better understanding of the dynamics of the atmosphere, not least the significance of its heat blanket effect and its relevance for the existence of life on Earth.
The days of the developed world going it alone are over and no climate agreement can ever be hailed a success unless it brings together all nations
It was only in December 1988, however, that the first real political milestone shaping the climate process we know today was made when Malta put forward its initiative in the United Nations General Assembly that condensed into the acclaimed UN resolution.
At the 1992 Rio Earth Summit the international community agreed on the landmark framework convention on climate change following which, in 1997, another remarkable step forward was made with the Kyoto Protocol. Kyoto still represents a formidable leap in the development of international environmental law, not least in the form of crafting an agreement with the industrialised economies and those in transition agreeing upon specific greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets with the collective aim of achieving five per cent overall emissions cut compared to 1990 levels in the years 2008 – 2012.
The world nations had obviously engaged in a political effort of mammoth proportions to secure the Kyoto agreement. Technicalities aside, it was all made possible thanks to the inherent flexible mechanisms enshrined in the protocol whereby emissions reduction targets could be achieved by means of three broad mechanisms: clean development, joint implementation and emissions trading. Whether the desired outcome from Kyoto has been achieved still remains a matter of debate, especially now that the world still depends so much on fossil fuel to meet its growing energy needs and that there is even more concern about emissions and the impact on climate.
Yet, there is one fundamental certainty ahead of Paris: the days of the developed world going it alone are over and no climate agreement can ever be hailed a success unless it brings together all nations, from the richest to the poorest, committing to low carbon growth. This has long been in the making as evidenced through the technical and political outcomes from the various climate summits at least since Copenhagen in 2009 when the 20C temperature limit was painstakingly agreed upon.
Over 150 countries have so far submitted their INDCs – Intended Nationally Determined Contributions – in preparation to Paris COP21. These constitute the countries’ respective emissions reduction pledges in the global effort not to exceed the 20C threshold. Hype or no hype that so many countries have already engaged, an authoritative assessment recently issued by the International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that with all countries abiding to their INDC pledges the best the global community can hope for is, at best, a 2.70C temperature rise compared to pre-industrial by end of century.
This is certainly not the catastrophic 40C, 50C or even 60C worst case scenarios as projected by Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change but, on the other hand, it neither represents the 20C temperature safe limit beyond which certain dangerous irreversible tipping points would be surpassed. Moreover, the Copenhagen Accord had concluded, somewhat obscurely, by reference to “strengthening the long-term goal referencing various matters presented by the science, including in relation to temperature rises of 1.5 degree Celsius”, which puts the 2.70C IEA estimate in an even more bleak perspective.
What really matters in the climate politics of 2015 and beyond is the Paris aftermath and what approaches shall be adopted by the world nations to make their INDC pledges a reality. There is a growing body of national and international climate law that is rapidly gaining momentum as recently exemplified by Malta itself through national climate action legislation. The COPs will remain a major focal point in the development of the climate politics of the future, working in parallel with the science that shall keep promoting fantastic technologies designed to curtail the negative consequences of global warming. The prospects are however that effective redress to the climate problem requires the development of a new global economic model that harnesses the market forces to such an extent that the full social cost of carbon emissions can be factored in.
In reality the seeds have already been sown. It remains to be seen whether politically the global economies are still an unaffordable long way off.
Alan Pulis specialises in environmental management.