The Politics of Climate Change (34 page)

An approach based on agreements or partnerships between individual nations, groups of countries and regions makes sense – and could eventually act to strengthen more universal measures. The Kyoto agreements already recognized several different clusters of countries, incorporating varying provisions for them.
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As one author remarked: ‘It is increasingly becoming clear [that] the Kyoto Protocol is less a global agreement than a set of differing regional approaches.'
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The experience of the World Trade Organization offers a parallel. It has proved impossible to reach agreement on the
Doha round of negotiations within the WTO, but progress on trade negotiation was made through regional and bilateral agreements. More than 200 such agreements are currently in operation. Studies have shown that such deals can support the overall objectives of the WTO's multilateral trading system rather than, as might seem to be the case on the surface, act to undermine them. Regional agreements have allowed countries to go beyond what has been possible to achieve universally; but these concordats have subsequently paved the way for progress made at the level of the WTO.

It makes sense for the big polluters, especially in aggregate terms, to get together in a regular way to try to push forward climate change policy that has bite. There is a forum already in existence that can serve as one of the agencies for such a task: the Major Economics Forum (MEF), which represents the world's 17 largest economies, including therefore a range of industrial and developing countries. In 2009 the MEF set up a Global Partnership to promote low-carbon technologies and develop other means of reducing emissions – acknowledging climate change to be ‘one of the greatest challenges of our time'.
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The main focus is upon ‘technology action plans' that focus upon 80 per cent of global CO
₂
created by energy production.

Each of the plans supplies detailed programmes addressed to national governments. They analyse the contribution that can be made to carbon reduction in the case of each technology or programme, identify barriers and best practice strategies to overcome them, and specify government action that can be taken on a concrete level to further such strategies.

The risk of undue complexity is evident, but the G20 can and probably should have a role in active climate change policy. Prior to Cancun, the G20 leaders pledged that they would ‘spare no effort to reach a balanced and successful outcome' there. In their meeting in Seoul in 2010, a robust statement about confronting climate change was made, but contained little detail.

It will be highly important to ensure that the poorer developing countries – the bottom billion – are not excluded and that their voice is heard. In a certain sense, it is right and proper that the ‘developing world' is now divided in two. The days
when the more successful emerging economies used to argue that the industrial countries have caused global warming, and that therefore they must exclusively be responsible for cutting carbon emissions, thankfully are over. The poorest nations, however, cannot at present be expected to engage in mitigation. For them, development is the highest priority, while adaptation takes precedence. The key issues – addressed in principle in the Climate Fund proposed in Copenhagen and Cancun – is that financial assistance and technological resources on the large scale should flow to such nations. Of course, a nest of problems and complexities is buried in such a bland statement, given the enormous difficulties the bottom billion faces.
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It might be thought improbable that the US and China could collaborate in a serious way on energy and climate change issues, but there is a precedent.
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During the Cold War period there appeared to be no chance that the main adversaries, the US and the Soviet Union, could negotiate fruitfully with one another. Yet, as Senator Joseph Lieberman has observed, such collaboration did develop, and it met with some success.
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At the outset of the arms control talks between the two protagonists, each was extremely wary of the other. Yet an effective interchange was achieved, with concrete results in terms of arms reductions. Lieberman points out that there is something of a parallel between the arms race of the Cold War and the competition for energy resources that is getting under way now.

Michael Klare suggested some while ago that a starting-point could be the setting up of an annual top-level US–China energy summit, led by the president of each country. It could be modelled on comparable meetings held at the height of the Cold War. The main aims were to minimize possible conflicts in the hunt for resources and to work out shared energy initiatives for the future, based on the fostering of low-carbon technologies. The objective would be to create a full bilateral
infrastructure, where officials, scientists and business leaders form joint committees and working-groups.

A preliminary ‘memorandum of understanding' for the creation of an energy dialogue between the two nations was already signed in 2004. In October 2008 it was announced that three Chinese companies, including the country's biggest state-controlled company, China Mobile, would join the non-profit Climate Group, which is backed by some leading Western businesses. The other two Chinese corporations are Suntech, the third largest solar energy manufacturer in the world, and a privately owned firm, Broad Air Conditioning. Western businesses involved include BP, BSkyB, Nike and Tesco. China Mobile aims to reduce the energy intensity of its activities by 40 per cent by 2020. Other Chinese companies have also enquired about joining the group, whose goal is to cover more than 100 of the world's biggest firms.

At the meetings at Copenhagen, as mentioned in
chapter 8
, the Chinese played an odd game of ‘catch-me-if-you-can' with the Americans. The Chinese leader, Hu Jintao, avoided President Obama until Obama gate-crashed the meeting that led to the setting up of the Accord. Neither Obama nor Hu attended the summit in Cancun, where Hillary Clinton represented the US. The two countries worked together much better than had been the case in Copenhagen. Clinton said afterwards that the US–Chinese cooperation was critical in forging the agreements that were reached. She added that it was time for ‘both nations to translate the high-level pledges of summits and state visits into action'.
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In January 2011 President Obama and President Hu met in Washington and agreed to enhance cooperation on climate change policy, renewable technology and technological transfer. They welcomed a recent announcement of joint work plans to be developed under the auspices of the US–China Clean Energy Research Centre, launched late in 2009. The work plans cover energy-efficient buildings, CCS and electric vehicles. More than 150 US and Chinese researchers will collaborate on the programme. Both leaders endorsed a statement of intent signed by the US Department of Energy and the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology on sharing data on electric vehicle projects in Los Angeles and Shanghai. As
with all agreements, the test is in the implementation – what will emerge of practical consequence and when?

The Indian government stands aside to some degree from China and Brazil in its attitudes to climate change policy. In the aftermath of Cancun, the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh stated that the emerging nations are not in a position to cut emissions, since they must place primacy upon economic development. Singh argued that, vast though it is in terms of territorial size and population, India only accounts for a relatively small proportion of total global emissions. The observation is true in terms of emissions per person. In aggregate terms, India is the fourth largest emitter of greenhouse gases worldwide. Moreover, it has high growth rates – growth propelled at present almost wholly by fossil fuels.

However, the Indian leadership played a constructive role both at Copenhagen and at Cancun. During the Cancun meetings, environment minister Jairam Ramesh hinted that India might reconsider its current position. At the moment, it has set a voluntary target of reducing energy intensity by 20 per cent over 2005 levels by 2020. A National Action Plan on Climate Change was published in 2008, but lacked detailed proposals and contained no specific targets. Substantial investments are planned in solar and nuclear technology.

Several recent reports have stressed how consequential climate change will be for India, and are likely to prompt a more ambitious attitude on the part of political leaders. Some 70 per cent of the summer flow of the river Ganges comes from meltwater from high snow fields and glaciers. Like almost everywhere else in the world, the glaciers are shrinking. Monsoon weather affects large parts of India; as climate change proceeds, many rivers will be vulnerable to the lethal mixture of flooding and drought that global warming brings in its train in such areas. The country has some of the most densely populated coastlines in the world, threatened by rising sea levels.

What happened at Copenhagen, and then at Cancun, means that negotiations and discussions between the states in the BASIC group (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) and the US will have a fundamental impact upon climate change politics. It is certainly desirable that they be joined by the EU if it can find the means to speak with a single voice – since the EU leads the way in actually cutting back emissions, rather than simply setting targets to do so.

Brazil could be a major influence on the world scene. Under President Lula da Silva and his successor, Dilma Rousseff, the country has assumed a much more active role in pushing for effective international strategies to combat climate change. Brazil has quite a different profile from the other large emerging economies. For one thing, it is home to one of the most significant ecosystems on the planet – the Amazon basin. It is hence
the
frontline country in the struggle against deforestation. How far deforestation can be controlled in the Amazon on its own will have a major effect on how far the worst effects of global warming can be avoided. Surveys show that Brazil's population has a higher level of concern about climate change and its implications than in most of the developed countries. In a survey taken in January 2011, 90 per cent of Brazilians agreed that climate change is happening and that it is a serious issue.
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Unlike China and India, the energy sector in Brazil contributes only a small proportion of the country's carbon emissions – a further factor that could enhance the country's influence over other countries internationally. Only about 17 per cent of Brazil's total emissions come from energy production, a lower proportion than most other industrialized or industrializing nations in the world. Some 40 per cent of the country's energy supply is generated by renewable sources, broadly interpreted, provided by a mixture of hydroelectric power, sugarcane (ethanol) and wood-pulp (its hydroelectric power stations, supplied from the water flowing from glaciers, are vulnerable to the effects of climate change).

Beginning in the 1970s, Brazil introduced an ethanol scheme for its transport sector. The programme was extended and intensified following the oil crisis of that decade. (For an account of its influence over the later use of biofuels in
Sweden, see above, pp. 127–8). Today it is the world's largest commercial application of biomass for transport. Virtually all cars in Brazil are capable of switching between ethanol and petrol. A national biodiesel programme was launched a few years ago, aimed at progressively increasing the biodiesel content in diesel fuel. Some beans and plants that readily grow over large parts of Brazil can be used to produce biodiesel.

In 2002, the Brazilian parliament endorsed legislation allowing small independent suppliers, including households, to feed energy into the national grid. In the same year, the government proposed the Brazilian Energy Initiative, designed to increase the spread of renewable energy throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.

President Lula consistently emphasized Brazil's vulnerability to climate change. During his period of tenure in office, the country was afflicted by unusually severe periods of flooding and of drought, which, in a speech in May 2009, he said were signs of climate change: ‘Brazil is feeling the climate changes that are happening in the world, when there is a deep drought in a place where there's never been one, when it rains in places where it never rains.'
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In the run-up to Cancun, Lula pointed out that Brazil was one of the few countries with concrete results to point to in terms of reducing carbon emissions. Brazil reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by over 30 per cent from the period between 2004 and 2009 – most of this, as mentioned in
chapter 4
, came from a substantial reduction in the deforestation of the Amazon area. In common with the other large developing states, the country originally set itself against the principle of legally binding emissions reductions targets. However, following the meetings in Copenhagen, Brazil approved a National Policy on Climate Change and adopted a voluntary target in the Accord of reducing greenhouse gases by 36–39 per cent by 2020 over a 2004 baseline. On current trends, the target will be achieved well before then.

Latin America might very well emerge as an important region for cooperative action on climate change. Several countries, including – besides Brazil – Mexico, Peru, Chile and Ecuador, have experienced unusual bouts of extreme weather over recent times. The leaders of those depending on the Andean glaciers are becoming disturbed by clear and
continuing signs of glacier retreat among other indicators of climate change. Mexico followed Brazil in being one of the first countries to set specific carbon reduction targets in 2008, with a pledge to halve carbon emissions by 2050 over 2002 levels.

Mexico of course played host to the Cancun meetings, where President Felipe Calderon stressed the urgency of the need for collective action to reduce emissions on a global scale. Costa Rica has pledged to become carbon neutral by 2021, having been for some while a leader in initiatives to do with sustainability.