Gio

BUENOS AIRES -- The Kyoto Protocol is dead -- there will be no further global treaties that set binding limits on the emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) after Kyoto runs out in 2012.

Under the Kyoto Protocol industrialized countries are supposed to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases 5.2% below their 1990 emissions levels during the first commitment period which runs from 2008-2012. The European Union agreed to reduce its overall GHG emissions by 8% during that period. To cut its carbon emissions, the European Union has established a carbon trading scheme in which companies must purchase permits to emit carbon. The number of carbon permits is capped at 8% below 1990 emission levels. The European Union and environmentalist activists have been pushing for negotiations to establish more stringent emissions limits for a second commitment period after 2012. It's not going to happen.



The conventional wisdom that it's the United States against the rest of the world in climate change diplomacy has been turned on its head. Instead it turns out that it is the Europeans who are isolated. China, India, and most of the rest of the developing countries have joined forces with the United States to completely reject the idea of future binding GHG emission limits. At the conference here in Buenos Aires, Italy shocked its fellow European Union members when it called for an end to the Kyoto Protocol in 2012. These countries recognize that stringent emission limits would be huge barriers to their economic growth and future development.



"I've been wondering if a cap and trade system for reducing carbon emissions would be successful," said Taishi Sugiyama, a senior researcher at Japan's Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry. "I think the answer is no. The market for carbon credits will likely shrink to be only within Europe after 2012." Sugiyama was participating in a panel discussion looking at "Options for post-2012 global climate regime". The consensus of the panel members including Henrik Hasselknippe of the Point Carbon trading consultancy, Jonathan Sinton from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and Axel Michaelowa the head of the International Climate Policy Program at the Hamburg Institute of International Economics, was that the Kyoto process is over. Sugiyama flatly predicted that Kyoto signatories Canada, Japan, and Russia will withdraw from the treaty after 2012.



So what now? Two different but complementary paths for addressing any future climate change have emerged from the Buenos Aires Climate Change Conference. The Europeans and activists have been pushing the first, which envisions steep near term reductions (next 20 years) in the emissions of GHG as a way to mitigate projected global warming. On the other hand, the United States has been advocating a technology-push approach in which emissions continue to rise and then GHG concentrations and emissions are cut steeply beginning in about 20 years. Over that time, the US sees the development of new energy efficient technologies, the creation of low cost methods for capturing and storing carbon dioxide both as emissions and atmospheric concentrations, and the invention of low carbon energy supplies. Such an approach has the advantage of fostering economic growth in the developing countries, lifting hundreds of millions from abject poverty over the next 20 years.



Sugiyama recommended that the technology-push approach be formalized outside of the Kyoto Protocol process with a Zero Emissions Technology Treaty. Such a treaty would have broad appeal because it avoids the inevitable conflicts over allocating emissions targets and because most countries recognize the importance of long-term technological progress. Sugiyama argued that a global cap and trade system is way too premature for developing countries to join because effective low cost ways to cut carbon emissions that they could use to binding emissions targets simply don't exist. "I cannot imagine a cap and trade system over the whole globe without low cost energy and emissions control technologies," said Sugiyama. However, as advanced energy technologies emerge over the next couple of decades, implementing a global cap and trade system becomes a more realistic prospect because developing countries will have access to effective technologies. In the meantime, the world could learn from the regional European carbon market what works and what doesn't work.



History will record that the COP-10 Buenos Aires Climate Change Convention is where it was first widely recognized that the Kyoto Protocol is a dead end. And where humanity chose to embark on a high tech path toward confronting whatever challenges any future global warming may present.

http://techcentralstation.com/121704G.html

dalem

Good riddance to bad garbage.

-dale

barrowaj

I think the Kyoto protocol is a great first step in helping prevent our planet from burning up. I thought that the US is going to be held to the protocol, even though we didn't ratify it, because we were part of the discussions on the protocol.

Bush says he didn't ratify it because it would be bad for our economy. I disagree. We of all countries should have the technological base to actually implement the changes required by Kyoto. Building green cars, houses, businesses, and factories would be come a completely new area of business that would help mediate some of the initial losses made in other sectors. Furthermore, Bush should realize that global warming is a cost that is not internalized into our economy. What this means is that while global warming will have a very negative impact on our environment, and hence our economy, nobody actually pays for the destruction. This is why it is useful for the government to step in to prevent us from destroying our country and our economy.

Anon

Kyoto was largely based on a now defunct enviromental model.

And yes, it would do severe damage to the US economy.

Confed999

Others start to see the light. (Though many, as seen here, still say it's Bush's fault. LOL )

__________________
No man is free until all men are free - John Hossack
I agree completely with this Administration’s goal of a regime change in Iraq-John Kerry
even if that enforcement is mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the Security Council fails to act-John Kerry
He may even miscalculate and slide these weapons off to terrorist groups to invite them to be a surrogate to use them against the United States. It’s the miscalculation that poses the greatest threat-John Kerry

Parihaka

I guess the TRUE marketplace, the environment, will now be the determining factor. We had a go at what we thought might be wrong, that's now abandoned, so lets sit back and see what happens. If there's no change we can keep driving our cars til we run out of gas. If there is dramatic environmental change we'll just need to adapt very quickly or die out, if not as a species then certainly as a civilisation, eh?

Confed999

The real hope is that they will instead try to focus on a realistic solution to enviornmental problems.

barrowaj

What research do you cite that indicates the environmental model is defunct?

You didn't read my earlier message. The negative short term impact on the economy would be mitigated by creating a new business sector devoted to developing environmentally friendly solutions. And don't forget that the damage to the economy caused by catastrophic global warming would be far greater than anything that ratifying Kyoto could cause.

As for the "lets continue and see what happens approach," it is a bad idea. The environment is a system where the delay between our actions and the effects of our actions is far apart. So by the time we realize that we have seriously screwed up, it could be too late. The best analogy I can think of is adjusting the hot water in your shower. If you find that the water is cold, and simply keep turning up the hot water without waiting for it to equilibrate, you will find yourself being scorched.

Finally, the United States would be really smart for implementing Kyoto because we have the technological advantage to implement its limits more efficiently than other countries. This would give us clout with which we could leverage other countries.

Parihaka

I haven't seen any attempt by any major polluter to offer any solutions to any environmental problems
(hey four anys, not bad)

Parihaka

sorry, we should have a 'sarcasm' smiley, I have a strong vested interest in seeing environmental protection become top of the agenda. When I was a child I could spend all day in the sun at the beach and go mildly red, brown by the next day. I must coat my daughter in spf 15 sunblock, she wears a knee to elbow uv resistant bathing suit, and that with these measures she can spend no more than 2 hours at the beach. why? because for 15 -20 years western governments ignored the scientific evidence that refrigerator gases destroyed ozone, which filters uv in the upper atmosphere. Ozone depletion still has a low agenda in the northern hemisphere because ironically air polution acts as an effective uv filter.
We do have some benefits here though; we can still drink our water out of the tap.


"trees are polluters, they drop leaves" Ronny Raygun

Confed999

If there is no proof Kyoto is going to help, then something different must be done. Personally I think it's going to require different technology, especially since so many are against Nuke power.

Praxus

Nuke is the only realistic solution.

Anon

"What research do you cite that indicates the environmental model is defunct?"

I read a very long article on it a couple months ago. The 'hockey stick' model that Kyoto was based on was found to be statistically invalid.

Confed999

There was a story posted on this board about it, not too long ago.

Parihaka

yeh, I waded through it, basically said that there was no link between observed statistical data and global warming, and that historical global warming was because of natural events. Second part pretty obvious really, since mankind has only recently been able to influence the environment to any great extent.
An interesting aside: a friend of mine who I trust for this sort of stuff says he found weather data during the period that jets were grounded following nine/eleven that was significantly statistically different from preceeding jets flying data i.e. jet aircraft over America have an observable effect on America's weather. I'll get him to send me the links.

Ten years ago I'd have damned nuclear power, now I'm not so sure, it would make hydrogen power systems viable which they currently aren't except in localized systems, unfortunately production doesn't reflect true cost, i.e. the unit cost of power from nucs doesn't factor in the storage and or disposal of nuclear waste. In other words future generations are required to subsidize our power use, debt deferral if you like.