by David Steven | Jun 15, 2009 | Climate and resource scarcity, North America
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 –
- Do you believe that President Obama’s domestic commitments on climate are consistent with a 450ppm stabilization target?
- Will the United States be pushing for a 450ppm target to be enshrined in the Copenhagen agreement?
- When does the United States think Chinese emissions should peak to meet 450ppm?
- When does the United States expect global emissions to peak?
by David Steven | Jun 12, 2009 | Climate and resource scarcity
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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by David Steven | Apr 2, 2009 | Climate and resource scarcity, London Summit
I have long thought that we’ll live to regret our failure to use the current crisis to nudge the global economy onto a greener trajectory. A WWF/E3G report, published today, heightens this fear.
By weighting elements of national stimulus packages, it offers a quick and dirty estimate of how green each one is. The answer is ‘not very’ with the UK’s risible effort one of the worst offenders.
The share of ‘climate friendly’ stimulus is small, researcher find, and it’s more than offset by investment in roads (including one to Manchester airport) and fossil fuel R&D (yes – read that and weep).
You can quibble with the analysis. Investment in nuclear is not included on the green side of the ledger – which seems unfair on the French, who have low per capita emissions relative to GDP and expect additional nuclear investment to push them lower. But the scoring is transparent and easy for others to replicate with different weightings.
And there’s a much bigger point: why is it up to a couple of NGOs to do this work? By now, the G20 should have set up standardised and sophisticated systems for monitoring the net carbon impact of each country’s stimulus package.
That they haven’t shows how confused and fragmented our thinking remains about the interlocking crises the world faces.
Disclosure: I recently agreed to act as an adviser to E3G in the run up to Copenhagen, but have had no involvement in any aspect of this report.
by David Steven | Mar 5, 2009 | Climate and resource scarcity, North America
Yesterday, I put some words into Barack Obama’s mouth – re-jigging JFK’s famous ‘man on the moon’ speech as a call for an immediate peak to global emissions.
Setting a goal that emissions should never rise again, is something I have argued we should do now, rather than hoping we’ll simply be braver or more desperate in five or ten years’ time.
Originally, I suggested this should be a major plank for civil society campaigning – and I still think it should be. But governments can play too. Let’s look at the policy from vantage point of the Obama administration. (more…)
by David Steven | Mar 4, 2009 | Climate and resource scarcity, North America
Extracts From Special Message to the Congress on Urgent National Needs
President Barack Obama
Delivered in person before a joint session of Congress
May 25, 2009
[With apologies to JFK’s ‘man on the moon‘ speech.]
The Constitution imposes upon me the obligation to “from time to time give to the Congress information of the State of the Union.” While this has traditionally been interpreted as an annual affair, this tradition has been broken in extraordinary times.
These are extraordinary times. And we face extraordinary challenges… [The President’s discussion of economic, security and resource threats has been cut from this transcript.]
…Finally, if we are to win the battle to secure our shared future, then we must act decisively to stabilize the world’s climate. Otherwise, we will begin to suffer the consequences of our folly within a generation – not just at home, but across the world, as we struggle to sustain security and prosperity on an increasingly crowded planet.
Since early in my term, serious efforts to tackle climate change here in America have begun. We have examined where we are strong, and where we are not, where we may succeed and where we may not. Now it is time to lead the world in a great new enterprise, one which will hold the key to our future on earth.
I believe we possess all the resources and talents necessary. But the facts of the matter are that we have never made the international decisions or marshaled the international resources required for such leadership. We have never before specified long-range goals on an urgent time schedule, or managed our resources and our time so as to insure their fulfillment.
I therefore believe we should set these global and national goals.
First, I believe that the world should commit itself to achieving the goal of stopping the inexorable rise in greenhouse gas emissions that is doing so much to put our planet in peril. I don’t believe we should aim to achieve this goal in 2020 or 2030 or 2050 – but right now in 2009, making this year the high water mark for mankind’s global experiment with the global climate.
Second, once we have bought emissions to a standstill, we should aim to force them down year by year – slowly at first, but at an ever increasing pace, triggering a radical transformation that brings us to a near zero carbon world by mid-century.
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