Yes, yes, it’s not a phrase one hears very often these days, but credit where it’s due: Gordon Brown’s climate change speech a week ago was first rate. Don’t just take it from me - Dan Smith thinks so too:

I think the Brown government – covered as it is with the ordure of scandal and recession that is dished out daily by the UK news media, the commentariat and the blogosphere – deserves a whole heap of credit for getting out in front of the crowd like this.

So what’s Brown done that’s so praiseworthy? In essence, the right thing on financing for climate change in developing countries (both the adaptation and the mitigation / technology transfer side of the equation). The key points in his speech are:

- a commitment that “I will commit the UK now to paying its fair share of the global total of [a climate financing mechanism for developing countries]. And we would expect other developed countries to do the same”;

- recognition that climate finance must be additional to the 0.7% aid target, and that “while some climate finance can come from official development assistance - where it clearly meets both poverty reduction and adaptation or mitigation objectives - a ceiling should be placed on this … in the UK we will limit such expenditure to up to 10% of our official development assistance. And we will work towards this limit being agreed internationally”;

- and a headline global needs figure of $100 billion a year by 2020 for adaptation.

These are really significant announcements.  The $100 billion figure is at the high end of the range of figures so far mentioned (and looking at the rate at which the science outlook is worsening on climate damages, the high end is the correct end of the spectrum). But better still is the absolutely explicit commitment on additionality. Aid advocates have been seriously worried about the potential that more and more development aid would end up being diverted to coping with climate, rather than actively reducing poverty - Brown’s speech puts a tough new benchmark in place.

The big question now is whether the Conservative party will match Brown’s pledge on adaptation finance. True, they say that they’re committed to reaching the 0.7% aid spending target (it’s one of only two spending areas that the Conservatives have promised to protect) - but that’s of little use if all the money ends up being diverted to coping with climate change…

Paul Krugman’s NYT column on Monday didn’t pull any punches as far as the 212 Congresspeople who voted ‘no’ on the Waxman-Markey climate bill were concerned:

as I watched the deniers make their arguments, I couldn’t help thinking that I was watching a form of treason — treason against the planet.

He continues:

…sometimes even the most authoritative analyses get things wrong. And if dissenting opinion-makers and politicians based their dissent on hard work and hard thinking — if they had carefully studied the issue, consulted with experts and concluded that the overwhelming scientific consensus was misguided — they could at least claim to be acting responsibly.

But if you watched the debate on Friday, you didn’t see people who’ve thought hard about a crucial issue, and are trying to do the right thing. What you saw, instead, were people who show no sign of being interested in the truth. They don’t like the political and policy implications of climate change, so they’ve decided not to believe in it — and they’ll grab any argument, nomatter how disreputable, that feeds their denial.

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Raymond Chandler got it wrong:

In fact, an analysis by The New York Times of rainfall and homicides for the last six years shows that when it rains substantially in the summertime, there are fewer homicides.

When there was no precipitation, there was an average of 17 homicides every 10 days. But when there was an inch or more of rain, the average dropped to 14.

That does not surprise Vernon J. Geberth a former Bronx homicide squad commanding officer. He said that when there was a downpour, the police would sometimes joke, “The best cop in the world is on duty tonight.”

The gap is even wider when looking just at Saturdays in the summer. Those are the days that typically post the highest number of homicides in a year. When there was no rain, the average number of homicides for every 10 Saturdays in summer jumped to 24. For every 10 Saturdays doused with at least an inch of rain, the average number was 18.

These numbers may add up to something of a bright spot for a city that officially entered summer with the second wettest June on record, according to meteorologists at Pennsylvania State University. With a little more than 200 homicides so far this year, the city is on pace for a low not seen since the early 1960s. The first few days of July promise more of the same damp weather, with a chance of rain every day.

News in the FT today that three environmental groups have filed a suit to make sure the Royal Bank of Scotland does more to promote renewable energy, foregoing its traditional dominance in oil and gas projects.

Ian Leggett, People & Planet’s director, said: “The government now controls RBS and has an exceptional opportunity to drive investments in low carbon jobs and infrastructure, not to repeat the recklessness of the past.”

As I’ve argued before, state-owned development banks have a key role to play in transforming our economies from a high to a low carbon footprint.

Modern project finance - particularly the use of the special purpose vehicle - was of great use in the 1970s to drive the development of the North Sea oilfields. It has been fundamental in creating the hydrocarbon society of the last 50 years.

We now need it to help us develop the post-hydrocarbon society.

While the development of the north Sea oil sector was mainly done by private oil companies and banks, although with some tax incentives from the government, I would suggest the construction of the post-hydrocarbon society is better driven by state-owned banks and retail investors than private banks, because these are capital intensive projects aimed at protecting the public good rather than private wealth.

RBS, with its expertise in project finance, is a good place to start.

Next week, Ban Ki-moon reaches the halfway point in his term as UN Secretary-General.  There’s been a trickle of negative stories of late about his performance.  Justified or not, they’ve brought his SG-ship (and what he needs to do to win a second term) into focus.  The debate has also introduced me to the fine word “noodge”.

The trouble began with a piece in the Economist giving Mr. Ban scores out of 10 on aspects out of his tenure.  8/10 for seeing the “big picture” on climate change and food scarcity, but 3/10 for “speaking truth to power” (mainly on Sri Lanka). Then this:

Management skills: 2/10 Mr Ban cuts an isolated figure, cut off by an inner circle of mostly Korean advisers. Communication with senior staff is poor, and since Mr Ban is not a good listener, it is hard to harness their expertise. What is needed is some leadership from Mr Ban and some clear goals to aim at.

Unluckily for the SG, this article came out just before his monthly press conference, and a canny hack asked him to comment. His response (which you can see here) has been described by UN-watchers as “angry” and “robust”.   The sheer passion doesn’t really come across.  But the FT got in on the act a few days later:

The questioning of Mr Ban’s record has become a staple of conversation among staff at the UN’s New York headquarters and of diplomatic chatter among the foreign missions that crowd midtown Manhattan.

So I doubt that the SG feels that well-disposed to the British quality press (times change: Kofi had a number of former FT journalists in his executive office). The Korean press has been complaining about the articles’ apparent anti-Asian bias.  The worst was to come from the US this week. Here’s Jacob Heilbrunn at Foreign Policy on, er, “the World’s most dangerous Korean”:

It’s not that Ban has committed any particularly egregious mistakes in his 2½ years on the job. But at a time when global leadership is urgently needed, when climate change and international terrorism and the biggest financial crisis in 60 years might seem to require some-any!-response, the former South Korean foreign minister has instead been trotting the globe collecting honorary degrees, issuing utterly forgettable statements, and generally frittering away any influence he might command. He has become a kind of accidental tourist, a dilettante on the international stage.

And so on. This time, it was Ban’s Chief of Staff Vijay Nambiar who got to strike back:

Heilbrunn’s account of United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in Foreign Policy’s July- August issue abounds in innuendo and patronizing commentary instead of serious analysis. Where others have seen Ban Ki-moon’s commitment to “big picture” issues such as climate change and the global food crisis, Heilbrunn only sees smoke and mirrors. Where others see the soft-spoken but tough-minded Secretary General speak out forthrightly amidst the rubble in Gaza, the author sees a “nowhere man”, and a “dangerous Korean”.

Hm: it looks like Ban’s team has filleted the Economist’s reference to the “big picture” but let other parts of its critique drop. Well, you can’t blame them for a bit of spin. And Mr. Ban will welcome a profile in The Nation that is far more sympathetic to his style:

Ban feels most comfortable and useful in the role of global noodge and pivotal player among nations and nongovernmental actors. A genial man given to informality who has been known to break into ditties or self-deprecating humor at sedate dinners, he is neither a charismatic figure nor a spellbinding speaker. He tries to cement his position a little wonkily through issues, with the world financial crisis sharing the top of the priority list with global warming.

Admittedly, the piece does go on to criticize the SG’s management style, but the battle for his reputation remains open.  What’s striking about the entire debate is that everyone (bar Heilbrunn) accepts that Ban’s tenure will be defined by climate change, on which he’s staked a huge amount of political capital.  Stuff like Darfur, high on his agenda in 2007, is out of the equation.  If the Copenhagen negotiations go well (which Ban may affect but cannot control), he’ll be able to draw a line under a lot of criticism.  If they prove unsatisfactory, there’ll be a lot more negative stuff.  For all his wonkiness and noodgity (if that’s a word) the SG seems to be a gambler who likes big stakes…

UPDATE: Stephen Schlesinger has weighed in with a broadly favorable profile of Ban for the Huffington Post.  And Ban has responded - in a typically measured fashion - to media criticism in a weekend interview.

UPDATE #2: But it’s not over.  Inner City Press (which is pretty virulently anti-Ban) implies that the Washington Post and NYT may swing in soon.  Even Al-Jazeera has got a dig in.  But Ban has doubtless taken comfort from a poll showing him to be the world’s most trusted statesman after Obama.

Bismarck once noted that “laws are like sausages: it’s better not to see them being made”. Were he around today, he might add that both laws and sausages are, in the US at least, based mainly on corn.

As I’ve just mentioned in a separate post, today is crunch time for the Waxman-Markey climate bill in the House, and so everyone’s watching the few remaining undecided Democrats, many of whom have big coal interests in their states. One set of Democrats that’s firmly in the ‘decided’ column, though, is the farm-lobby - who will be busting out cold beers and chucking ribs on the grill this weekend if the Bill passes. 

Not long ago, the farm lobby were adamantly opposed to the bill, which they feared could increase their input prices, especially fuel for on-farm energy use. Moreover, the mighty corn lobby was especially unhappy that it wasn’t invited to the cap and trade party, as National Corn Growers Association President Bob Dickey made very plain on May 18th:

“After reviewing the legislation, we can see the bill does not clearly provide for a mechanism by which corn growers can sell carbon credits on the market. We strongly believe the bill will increase input costs without specific opportunities to offset those additions. We cannot support the American Clean Energy and Security Act in absence of the provisions that we have explained in some length to the Committee.”

Well, that was then. The bill now includes an amendment submitted by House Agriculture Committee chairman Collin Peterson, which will:

• create a market for agricultural offsets that allows the sector to take part in cap-and-trade;
• have this market regulated by the US Department of Agriculture, not the Environmental Protection Agency; and
• explicitly exempt agriculture from having an emissions cap of its own.

Oh dear. (more…)

The Waxman-Markey Bill will go to the floor of the House today or tomorrow, so Obama and Pelosi are on a determined bid to round up the few remaining undecided Democrats (mainly from rust belt coal states). US environment NGOs have (apart from Greenpeace - quelle surprise) saddled up for a massive mobilisation, and staking every last cent of political capital on leveraging the outcome: the League of Conservation voters went so far as to write to House members saying,

“In light of the tremendous importance of this legislation, LCV has made the unprecedented decision that we will not endorse any member of the House of Representatives in 2010 election cycle who votes against final passage of this historic bill.”

If recent polling data is accurate, then the US public seems to be behind the case for tough action: a Washington Post-ABC poll conducted June 18-21, for instance, has nearly twice as many people approving of Obama’s handling of global warming as those disapproving at 54% vs 28% - a touch down on late April, when the ratio was 61% vs 23%, but still robust.

Better still, 75% of people thought the federal government should “regulate the release of greenhouse gases” vs 22% ’should not’ - and wierdly, if the question is adapted to include “What if it raised the price of things you buy”, then the ratio widens to 80% vs 18%. That said, on cap-and-trade specifically, the numbers are far closer: 52% support vs 42% opposed, as compared to 59% vs 34% in late April.

But the really stand-out finding for me is about how American voters regard international cooperation on climate.  The question put to them on this was as follows:

Do you think the United States should take action on global warming only if other major industrial countries such as China and India agree to do equally effective things, that the United States should take action even if these other countries do less, or that the United States should not take action on this at all?

Answer: 18% think the US “should not take action at all” [i.e. irrespective of what other countries may or may not do]; 20% think the US should “take action only if other countries do”; and 59% think the US should “take action even if other countries do less”.  Last time that question was asked in this poll was July last year, when the same numbers were 13% / 18% / 68%.  So there’s weakening, sure - but considering that last year was before the credit crunch really kicked in, what’s interesting here is how well the numbers have held up.

From a post here last October:

[We can expect] a reduction in commodity prices for the duration of the global downturn (however long that may be) as demand for them falls.  As I’ve mentioned, futures prices for grain crops are already falling; we can expect that trend to be supported by falling energy prices, which will reduce some of the pressure on food that’s come via fertiliser prices, transport costs and demand for crops as biofuels.

That said, let’s be clear: the fall in commodity prices due to a global downturn does not mean that we’re out of the woods for good on high food and fuel prices. As Javier Blas notes in the FT today, the downturn also means that necessary investment in increasing supply will be put off.  As soon as we’re out of the dowturn and demand starts going up again, we’ll discover that there’s been no shift in the underlying supply fundamentals - and hence that the stagflation drivers we were all worrying about until the credit crunch really began in earnest are just waiting where we left them.

Latest oil price data (Jul 08 - now, courtesy of BBC News):

Latest FAO Food Price Index:

US climate envoy, Todd Stern has tried to clarify exactly what the Obama administration wants from China on climate at Copenhagen (see post from Leo and me on the confusing signals the US has been sending out).

So here it is:

• “Very considerable” reductions on China’s business as usual emissions.
• These reductions to be binding, transparently measured and verifiable.
• No absolute emissions reductions but (preferably at least) a designated year when China’s emissions should peak.
• China’s commitment to be consistent with the world stabilising its emissions at around 450 ppm (”we don’t know whether it’s 445 or 460 or… but in that general range”).
• The package to be backed up by carbon offsets from the US to China - but these offsets should have “real environmental integrity” - and technology cooperation.

Obvious questions to ask Stern -

1. Do you believe that President Obama’s domestic commitments on climate are consistent with a 450ppm stabilization target?
2. Will the United States be pushing for a 450ppm target to be enshrined in the Copenhagen agreement?
3. When does the United States think Chinese emissions should peak to meet 450ppm?
4. When does the United States expect global emissions to peak?

At the end of his three day visit to Beijing this week Todd Stern, the US Climate Change Envoy, held a press conference with the Chinese press at which he said that China was doing great and the US didn’t expect China to commit to a cap on its greenhouse gas emissions (unsurprisingly this made the first page of the China Daily, the main English language mouthpiece of the Communist Party).

The Guardian headline was unequivocal: “The US will exempt China from binding greenhouse gas targets.”

Guardian environment correspondent, David Adam, had had a chat with Jonathan Pershing, who leads the American climate delegation, and Pershing had told him that only developed countries need take on binding targets to reduce emissions. ”We’re saying that the actions of developing countries should be binding, not the outcomes of those actions.”

Now, that’s a big deal. After all, back in 1997, the US Senate made it crystal clear that it had no intention of ratifying Kyoto unless the agreement included “new specific scheduled commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions” for all developing countries, and China, Mexico, India, Brazil, and South Korea in particular.

Now, you can argue the toss about the merits of the US position (my personal view is that China should bind itself at Copenhagen to an agreed date by which its emissions will peak), but for Obama’s team to say at this stage - do a bit more on energy efficiency and renewables, and we’ll give you a free pass on targets - would be astounding.

Turns out Der Spiegel has a more detailed and much clearer interview with Pershing.

SPIEGEL: But the Chinese don’t want to accept legally binding reduction targets for CO2. Does the US still insist on such a commitment?

Pershing: Yes, definitely. We are still asking them to commit to legally binding CO2 reductions as part of a Copenhagen agreement.

SPIEGEL: With only five months left until the Copenhagen summit, do you think such a compromise will be possible?

Pershing: We are working very hard to achieve a good solution. The US remains focused on a legally binding agreement and on concluding that agreement in Copenhagen. We expect all developed nations to commit to comparable reduction targets and we want more countries to belong to the group of industrialized countries than today, for example Korea. Major economies with large total emissions like China should take additional steps, including a quantitative and quantifiable set of actions with a legal requirement to implement those actions.

So what gives? A fine line between ‘reductions’ and ‘targets’? Pershing going off script? Or sloppy reporting from the Guardian’s journalist?

(Via @tancopsey on Twitter - follow me @davidsteven.)

Update - And we have our answer - sloppy Guardian reporting. Its original story went up online at 14.53 BST, but was extensively revised and corrected at 18:31 (the old version simply disappeared, but there’s a copy below).

The new headline: “US says it will not demand binding carbon cuts from China.” So targets are still on the table; immediate absolute reductions are not (and they never were - the idea is utterly implausible).

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Royal Dutch Shell - Flickr User Lee Otis

After 13 years, Royal Dutch Shell has agreed to pay $15.5 million compensation to settle a court case over its alleged part in the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa and other Ogoni leaders in the Niger Delta. Much of the backstory can be found here.

Now I’m no judge (not yet, anyway), but $15 million doesn’t seem a lot for a firm with 2008 revenues of $458 billion. Michael Goldhaber, who does know something about law, describes the sum as ‘nuisance value’ from Shell’s point of view.

Yet the fact that Shell settled the day before the trial was due to begin is indicative of the firm’s distaste for either the publicity that court proceedings would create, or the culpability that might be uncovered. (more…)

Mild surprise has been heard in various quarters that the next G20 summit - scheduled for 24-25 September - is to be held in Pittsburgh, rather than in New York (more logical, given that the G20 will take place right in the middle of the first week of the UN General Assembly) or Washington DC. Take for example this transcript of a press conference by White House Press Secretary Robert Gibb last week:

MR. GIBBS:  One quick announcement before we get started.  The United States will host the next G20 summit, September 24th through the 25th, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Q    Where?

Q    What?

Here’s the answer to the ‘Why Pittsburgh?’ question, taken from a White House statement quoted in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

Pittsburgh has demonstrated a commitment to employing new and green technology to further economic recovery and development.

Yarone Zober, the Pittsburgh Mayor’s chief of staff, echoes the point in the same article:

Pittsburgh has really been a model for an economic turnaround,” he said, noting the smokestacks-to-knowledge transformation of the regional economy and the development of environmentally friendly “green” job sectors.

More on Pittsburgh’s turnaround in this Huffington Post piece.

As I noted back in April, the London Summit was a respectable outcome, but fell disappointingly short on the green new deal front. But with this backdrop, and an agenda that for now still remains wide open, maybe - maybe - the September summit will do better.

A while back, David did a post extolling the virtues of biochar as a potentially important - but widely overlooked - element of the response to climate change. Well, here’s another: black carbon.

As Durwood Zaelke of the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development notes, black carbon is “the dark soot that comes from old diesel vehicles and burning biomass for cooking”. It accelerates global warming in two crucial ways: first, by absorbing more heat while particles of it float around in the atmosphere, and second by darkening snow and ice surfaces after it falls to the ground, thereby absorbing still more heat.

It’s a big deal.  One recent study cited by Zaelke suggests it’s responsible for 50% of Arctic warming; another that it reduces springtime Eurasian snow cover by as much as CO2 does.  Black carbon’s also a major part of the recent why the MIT study published 2 days ago is so gloomy (it predicts “a median probability of surface warming of 5.2 degrees Celsius by 2100, with a 90% probability range of 3.5 to 7.4 degrees” - great).

The good news?  This is eminently tackle-able, especially through pretty basic technologies like better cooking stoves and smoke hoods. More good news?  Undertaking a major push on this would not only deliver immediate progress on reducing climate change, but would also save millions of lives and make a tangible difference to achieving the Millennium Development Goals. 

As Practical Action (one of the best NGOs in this area) summarise, more than a third of humanity (2.4 billion people) use biomass as their main cooking fuel, of whom 800m depend exclusively on crop residues and dung. Smoke in the home from these fires kills 1.6 million people a year - mainly women and kids. That’s more than malaria, and almost as much as poor water and sanitation. This WHO graph shows worldwide causes of death and illness:

While this one shows causes of death among under-fives:

So sorting out such stoves is one of those rare things, a genuine win-win. It’s also something the development community could actually deliver.  As a rule I’m sceptical when I see the aid world cheerfully adopting a throw-money-at-it approach - but one area where resource transfer can clearly achieve results is when (a) it’s geared towards getting stuff distributed, and (b) the stuff in question doesn’t depend on complex delivery systems (such as a functioning health sector).  In those conditions, donors can be extremely effective: look at distribution of bed-nets to combat malaria.

So: someone needs to initiate a major push on universal access to basic stoves and safe cooking technology.  But who has the standing to unite the climate world and the development world in this endeavour, and could also bring it to G8 or G20 summits for high level political cover? 

Sounds like a job for the SG to me.

Today’s Guardian has a big splash announcing that “China and US held secret climate talks“.  According to Suzanne Goldberg,

A high-powered group of senior Republicans and Democrats led two missions to China in the final months of the Bush administration for secret backchannel negotiations aimed at securing a deal on joint US-Chinese action on climate change, the Guardian has learned.

The report continues that the track 2 talks were orchestrated by the Carnegie Endowment’s Bill Chandler, who says that “My sense is that we are now working towards something in the fall… It will be serious. It will be substantive, and it will happen.”

Hmm. For all the breathless talk of “secret” dealings and ”backchannel” negotiations about which “the Guardian has learned”, you have to figure that the talks probably weren’t that secret if Radio Free Asia was able to report fully two months ago that,

China has raised hopes for environmental cooperation with the United States despite differences that emerged during a Washington visit by leading officials this month. 

On March 18, Xie Zhenhua, vice chairman of the National Development Reform Commission (NDRC), stressed a positive outlook for cooperation on climate change at a Washington meeting co-hosted by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Global Environmental Institute of Beijing. After years of disagreement over which country bears greater responsibility for global warming, Xie, China’s top climate negotiator, voiced readiness to discuss joint action.

If you’re wondering where Bill Chandler is coming from on climate change, then this 2007 interview with CFR  is worth a look (n.b. his heavily sceptical view of Kyoto’s crappy Clean Development Mechanism); more up-to-date and in depth is this 2008 article entitled “Breaking the Suicide Pact: US-China Cooperation on Climate Change” (see also this summary on China Stocks Blog).

There’s a lot of good stuff in the article, with a particular focus on cooperation on best practice technologies and innovation in new ones.  But here’s what gives me pause: “Both countries could reach a deal - without a treaty - that could unlock the global stalemate”.

Without a treaty? Hmm. Chandler’s article is full of sensible proposals for confidence building measures between the US and China.  But none of these can substitute for a global system of binding, quantified targets, if the world wants to be sure of stabilising greenhouse gas concentrations at any given level.  Initiatives like this are useful - but if we learned anything from the Bush Administration, it’s that there’s always the risk of them becoming figleaves.