Mar. 23, 2009 (The Hindu Business Line) --
are required for industrial activities.
P. P. Sangal
All eyes are now on evolving a workable and effective ‘climate change’ treaty in Copenhagen in December 2009, as a successor to the Kyoto Protocol which expires in 2012.
It was expected that climate talks in Poznan (Poland) in December 2008 would pave the road to successful finalisation of such a treaty, but unfortunately that did not happen — the process, kicked off at Bali (Indonesia) in December 2007, has s
lipped in many ways.
Hurdles in the way
Why did the deadlock harden at Poznan? This was because developing countries did not give even a preliminary response to the four proposals submitted by developing countries on (a) mitigation of carbon emissions, (b) adapting to climate change, (c) clean technology transfer, and (d) creating a global adaptation fund and mechanism for its operation.
Perhaps, it was also because rich developing nations, reeling under severe financial crisis, were in no mood to cut emissions thinking that this would further aggravate their economic travails.
But mitigating ‘climate change’ makes economic sense too. The US President, Mr Barack Obama’s proposed investment of $150 billion over 10 years to catalyse private efforts to build a clean energy future and create five million jobs simultaneously is a perfect example of integrating the rejuvenation of American economy with combating ‘climate change’.
There is another hurdle in the negotiations. Developed countries were required, as per the Kyoto Protocol, to reduce their carbon emissions by 5.2 per cent of the 1990 level by 2012, but that hardly seems to be in sight. They now want to impose emission targets on developing nations. Further, they want to make up for their inaction on emission reduction by buying carbon credit certificates abroad at cheaper rates.
Does it not sound like giving rich countries a free licence to pollute more at the cost of poor nations?
Reconciling objectives
In view of this grim scenario, the question arises of how to reconcile these conflicting objectives. Here are a few suggestions.
First, the percentage emission reduction targets have to be much higher for countries already having very high per capita emissions.
For example, per capita emissions vary from 23 tonnes for the US to 8-12 tonnes for Japan, the EU countries, Australia, Canada, etc., to little over one tonne for India.
After all, the poor in Asia, Africa and Latin America also have to be assured a good quality of life and so their development work has to go on.
