Tiempo Climate Newswatch

The European Union (EU), largely sidelined at the Copenhagen climate summit, is blaming the United States and China for the "great failure" of the talks. "It was obvious that the United States and China didn’t want more than we achieved at Copenhagen," commented Andreas Carlgren, the environment minister of Sweden, which currently holds the EU presidency. The EU’s strategy of offering to deepen its emissions cuts if other nations showed comparable efforts failed to shift the position of the United States or China. "We’ve been taught some lessons about the realities of the so-called multi-polar world," said Carl Bildt, Swedish foreign minister. "These lessons will have to be taken into account when we go for a more comprehensive global agreement." Carlgren did say, though, that the Copenhagen Accord means that United States negotiators "can now show the [United States] Senate that they have an agreement with [major developing nations such as] China, India, Brazil and South Africa", removing a long-standing obstacle. "Now the pressure is on the United States to really deliver," he concluded.

The carbon market responded to the Copenhagen Accord with an immediate fall of ten per cent in the price of EU emissions permits. Opinions on the agreement amongst analysts were, however, mixed. Trevor Sikorski of Barclays Capital saw the Accord as a "very disappointing outcome that is even below our modest expectations... I see nothing here that should drive investment in the carbon commodity and low carbon technology." David Metcalfe at Verdantix advised that "executives responsible for energy and climate change plans should avoid new investments in the Kyoto-based global carbon markets." Citing badly defined rules, insufficient United Nations staff and a depressed carbon price that conspire to make a very high risk market, he believes that "the Accord further postpones crucial reform of this dysfunctional market mechanism." Richard Gledhill of PwC was more optimistic. "America is going to take action on climate now," he said. "If passed by Congress, United States climate legislation could create a market three times the size of the EU scheme. That would be a massive boost to the global carbon market," he continued.

Ed Miliband, British secretary of state for climate and energy, accused China of vetoing reference to specific emissions targets, such as the need for 50 per cent reductions in global emissions by 2050, in the Copenhagen Accord. "We cannot again allow negotiations on real points of substance to be hijacked in this way," he said, calling for "major reform of the United Nations body overseeing the negotiations and of the way the negotiations are conducted." In a swift response, Jiang Yu from the Chinese foreign affairs ministry referred to the statement as "plainly a political scheme," intended to "shirk the obligations of developed countries to their developing counterparts and create discord among developing countries." While intent on showing leadership in reducing its emissions growth, China is wary that it, along with other major developing nations such as India, may face demands to take on formal emissions targets at some future date. Yvo de Boer, head of the climate treaty secretariat warned that "all this finger-pointing and recrimination" could cloud negotiations next year. "We need to work together constructively," he said.

The claim by India's environment minister Jairam Ramesh that his country got a "good deal" out of the Copenhagen summit by avoiding emissions targets has been described as baseless. "India buckled under pressure in Copenhagen," said a statement from the Center for Science for Environment (CSE) in New Delhi. "The Copenhagen Accord that India plans to sign will erase both historical responsibility and the distinction between industrialized and non-industrialized countries from future climate change negotiations." Suparno Banerjee from CSE lamented the lack of legally-binding targets that the developed countries have to meet. "We have failed to agree at a sort of solution which will lead us to a viable action plan towards controlling climate change. And we believed that it is a disastrous summit and it is specially disastrous for India's poor and the vulnerable section because they are going to be most severely hit," he said.

Grace Akumu, Kenya's technical adviser on climate change, has warned that the failure of world leaders to commit to sharp reductions in greenhouse gas emissions will have serious consequences for developing nations. "The deal in Copenhagen will do very little to end the damage of climate change, particularly for the poorest in Africa," she said. She criticized the funding, the Copenhagen Green Climate Fund, allocated to developing nations in the Copenhagen Accord. "The money is very little," she said. "All of us were shocked when the continent’s spokesperson, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, backed this proposal." Kenya is seeking US$3 billion annually to support its climate change response strategy, but the global start-up fund only amounts to US$10 billion a year. Bangladesh will seek 15 per cent of the global start-up fund but "this money is not enough to enhance our adaptation capability," said Hasan Mahmud, state minister for environment and forests. "We expect bilateral assistance too to finance our mitigation and adaptation plans," he said. The government plans to construct new embankments, repair 11,000 kilometers of coastal embankment and build more cyclone shelters.

While the Copenhagen Accord calls for the immediate establishment of a mechanism to unleash funds for forest protection, just what this means for the REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation in Forest Degradation in developing countries) programme remains to be resolved. Funding has been the critical issue, with developing countries reluctant to take on targets for reducing deforestation without a clear financial commitment. Without targets, "REDD becomes toothless," according to Peg Putt of the Australian Wilderness Society. It has been estimated that at least US$25 billion a year would be needed to launch the programme. To date, US$3.5 billion has been committed to preparatory work over the coming three years. Nevertheless, the endorsement of REDD in the Copenhagen Accord has sent a clear signal to the foresty industry. "Once we implement REDD projects, we cannot anymore allow uncontrolled illegal logging. That kind of leakage will not be acceptable to the global community," commented Indonesian environment minister Sarwono Kusumaatmadja.