Tiempo Climate Newswatch

Controversy developed during the run-up to the release of the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on climate impacts, adaptation and vulnerability as scientists and government representatives argued over the final wording. There was, for example, disagreement over the inclusion of a table indicating likely impacts for every degree of global warming and over the inclusion of a statement explicitly linking cause and effect. Objections to the text came mostly from the United States, China and Saudi Arabia. Some scientists walked out at one point and a number said that they would not be involved in the IPCC process in future. Martin Parry, co-chair of the working group responsible for the report, acknowledged that "certain messages were lost", but insisted that "the report was not watered down in the broad thrust."

Responding to the report, Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, said that the "projected impacts tell us that we urgently need to launch an agreement on future international action to combat climate change, as well as look for effective ways to generate the funds needed for adaptation." "Our current sources of funding are insufficient to cover... adaptation needs," he continued. "So the international community needs to investigate new and innovative sources of finance, not least through the carbon market, in order to ensure that the most vulnerable communities are able to cope." Achim Steiner, head of the United Nations Environment Programme, called for action at the national level "to mainstream ‘climate proofing’ into all areas of economic life so that countries and communities... have a chance to adapt and thus a chance to avoid some of the more extreme impacts."

Japan and China have agreed to "actively participate" in the process of developing an effective climate regime for beyond 2012. The commitment came after a meeting between Chinese premier Wen Jiabao and Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe in Tokyo, Japan. The meeting was held as Chinese and Japanese companies discussed closer business ties between the two countries in the areas of energy saving, clean coal and nuclear power.

The two nations agreed to cooperate in the development and safe operation of nuclear power. According to a joint statement, "both countries understand that expansion of nuclear power generation in Asia and the world helps to ease energy supply-demand tightness and stop global warming." China and Japan also agreed to cooperate in the desulphurization of Chinese coal-fired plants, the establishment of an experimental model of a recycling society in Qingdao, China, the development and use of renewable energy, such as solar power, and training in energy saving policies.

Trade in carbon permits doubled to more than US$26 billion in 2006, according to Point Carbon. "You're helping... serve our global civilization so well," former United States vice-president Al Gore told delegates at Carbon Market Insights 2007, held in Copenhagen, Denmark earlier this year. Italy will open an emissions trading exchange in April and Canada will announce plans for regulating emissions this month. Meanwhile, full operation of the European trading scheme is being delayed as countries wait for United Nations (UN) approval to trade and for software links between the European and UN systems to be put in place.

The European Union plan to cut emissions by 20 per cent by the year 2020 has strengthened confidence in the future of carbon markets and will increase financial assistance to developing nations. "We’ve calculated that if the European Union does this 20 per cent cut and does about half of it through flexibility mechanisms... that could generate an [annual] carbon finance flow of US$15 billion by 2020," said Yvo de Boer, head of the climate treaty secretariat. "That is a potential flow of resources that can also represent an attractive incentive to developing countries to green their economic growth." Gore did caution investors in Copenhagen not to neglect the sustainability goals of flexibility mechanisms such as the Clean Development Mechanism. "I don't want to flag that as a major challenge to the integrity of the system, but it would become one if it were not attended to, and much work is being focused on that," he said.