Urgency, compromises needed in climate change talks

COMPLACENCY will doom the planet, a ranking official of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned, as negotiators from over 190 nations gird for two weeks of talks in Cancun to come up with an agreement that will stop Earth from warming too much.

“The IPCC cannot be policy-prescriptive, but it seems to me that many negotiators lack the sense of urgency that is needed to make the right decisions, which in a multilateral framework cannot be taken without some compromises,” said Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, vice-chairman of the IPCC, via an online interview last Thursday.

“We only have one inhabitable planet in the solar system, some seem to forget that.”

The sixteenth Conference of the Parties (COP) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change got underway yesterday at Mexico’s premier tourist destination, with expectations set low after COP 15 in Copenhagen last December failed to come up with a new treaty binding developed nations to emission cuts.

COP 16, instead, is expected to come up with agreements on climate change adaptation, financing, technology transfer and measures against deforestation in developing countries, which hopefully will lay the groundwork for a binding agreement in COP 17 next year.

The Kyoto Protocol, which requires industrialized nations to cut emissions 5% below 1990 levels, will lapse after 2012.

The Copenhagen Accord, the main outcome of COP 16, did recognize the need for deep emission cuts and to cap global temperature rise to below two degrees Celsius, relying on the IPCC’s conclusions.

The IPCC is a scientific body that collates and reviews data on climate change. Its findings spurred the drafting of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the framework for tackling climate change worldwide. It was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with former US Vice President Al Gore in 2007.

In its fourth assessment report released in 2007, IPCC said the planet was warming due to greenhouse gas emissions stemming from human activities and would continue to do if emissions were not mitigated.

“There is high agreement and much evidence that with current climate change mitigation policies and related sustainable development practices, global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions will continue to grow over the next few decades,” it noted.

“Continued GHG emissions at or above current rates would cause further warming and induce many changes in the global climate system during the 21st century that would very likely be larger than those observed during the 20th century,” it added.

Mr. van Ypersele said negotiators in Cancun should not ignore the scientific evidence gathered by the IPCC.

“I believe the more the negotiators take the knowledge reflected in the IPCC reports into account, the more successful Cancun is likely to be. What is needed is a balanced set of decisions leading the way into a more comprehensive agreement next year in South Africa. Good decisions need to be informed by science,” he said.

The IPCC is preparing its fifth assessment report and Mr. van Ypersele said the IPCC’s message was unlikely to change.

“Eight hundred thirty-one scientists are just starting their assessment work for the next IPCC reports in 2013 and 2014. It is a bit premature to prejudge the content of this report.

“I would like to note however the key messages of the IPCC reports have not evolved so much over the last 20 years: climate is warming; since about 50 years, it is mostly due to greenhouse gases released by human activities; consequences will mostly be negative for both ecosystems and human life; adaptation measures exist and can reduce the severity of impacts; deep emission cuts are needed to stabilize climate; and finally, technologies, policies and measures are available to cope with the problem, and can offer co-benefits,” he said.

“Sea level will definitely increase over the coming decades, at least 18 to 59 centimeters between 1990 and 2100, plus some contribution from melting ice sheets. This will affect all coastal cities and regions,” he pointed out.

“It is very likely that the new report will offer new perspectives but will emphasize these points again, and offer new details to illustrate or support them.”

While the IPCC cannot be policy-prescriptive, Mr. van Ypersele stressed, countries, developed or not, need to bridge differences to come up with an international agreement.

“Climate change is a global problem. A ton of CO2 has the same effect on climate wherever it comes from,” he pointed out. “The participation of all emitters, past and future, is important in any global climate agreement.”

Damian Ryan, senior policy manager of The Climate Group, a nonprofit pushing for global emission cuts through new technologies, said the dichotomy between developed and developing countries cannot remain.

“I think developing countries should be taking action based on their common but differentiated responsibilities,” he said during the same online interview. “So this means there will be a spectrum of actions, from the least developed countries that simply need to focus on their development with the support of richer nations, to those countries on the cusp [or even over the cusp] of developed country status.”

“The continuation of a simple, binary split between developed and developing countries needs to evolve.” –JUDY T. GULANE, Sub-Editor, Businessworld