Britain rules out climate treaty at summit
Officials say major powers too far apart for legal deal in Copenhagen next month
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British Government officials believe there is no hope of signing a legally binding climate change treaty in Copenhagen next month.
The positions of major world powers are so far apart that another year or even more may be needed to negotiate a world climate treaty, senior British sources said at talks in Barcelona, which end today.
The likely delay will dismay millions of people in countries already threatened by global warming and further heighten the risk of dangerous climate change. It means another 50 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide will go into the atmosphere from industry, power generation, transport and deforestation before the world can agree on how to cut it back and try to keep rising temperatures below the critical C above the pre-industrial level, which is regarded as the danger threshold.
The key accord – if it is eventually signed – may now be known by the world as the Mexico City treaty, which is where the next full-scale UN climate meeting is scheduled to be held, in December 2010.
Writing today for The Independent the Chancellor, Alistair Darling, also admits that a deal in Copenhagen is now unlikely. "The barriers to agreement on climate finance remain substantial," he writes. "Even if countries agree the levels of finance, few will want to hand over money if they lack confidence in the means of delivering it."
The development has disconcerted observers at Barcelona, where it has become clear over the course of this week's talks that countries are still so far apart on how to act on climate change – with the American position the farthest from everyone else – that the most that Copenhagen can now produce is a "political" agreement on climate change, which would not be legally binding like the current climate treaty, the Kyoto protocol.
But yesterday's frank admission, for the first time, that it might take another year or even longer to produce a proper treaty, after 10,000 officials from 192 countries have already spent two years working to a Copenhagen deadline, showed just how bogged down the negotiating process has become.
Although there are various stumbling blocks, there is no doubt that the continued lack of a serious American offer on cutting its greenhouse gas emissions and providing climate finance for the developing nations – the bill which might provide them is stuck in the US Senate – is the principle obstacle to progress. "Copenhagen is one of the most important meetings in human history. But the politicians seem determined to blow it," said Joss Garman, climate campaigner for Greenpeace.
"The US is becoming a dead weight in these talks, and so much can be blamed on the Big Carbon special interests that are driving Washington's position. It's time for Europe to stand up, not give up."
But British sources said yesterday that it was now "simply not possible" to sign a legally binding climate treaty at the meeting, which lasts from 7 to 19 December.
Negotiations to do this after Copenhagen would take "at least six months" and the process would be "ideally, no longer than a year", the sources said. Negotiators are already discussing options for further climate meetings in 2010; Germany in June and Mexico in December are the intended locations.
However, Britain is now leading a push to give teeth to the accord which Copenhagen is expected to produce.
"The UK is pushing for a comprehensive, politically binding UN agreement at Copenhagen which also sets out a very clear timetable to a legally binding treaty," said a spokeswoman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change.
Yesterday the Energy and Climate Change Secretary, Ed Miliband, said that although talks were "moving slowly and not going well", he still thought it possible that the US would agree to such a deal next month.
America had "a clear set of ambitions" despite its "domestic issues," he said, adding: "We know we need them as part of an agreement. The biggest flaw in Kyoto was not having the US in that agreement." His optimism was given some backing at Barcelona. The US head of delegation at the talks, Jonathan Pershing, when asked if a politically binding agreement and then a legally binding agreement were possible, said: "We think we can get both."
Mr Pershing said: "We think we can an agreement of substance that gets countries involved and includes all the key elements. We think that is possible."
World climate treaty Catch-22: The obstacles
United States Senate
The chief obstacle. Potential US offers on emissions cuts and finance are bogged down in the Climate Bill going through the Senate, which is now not expected to be passed before the Copenhagen meeting. It means that the US has been unable to make firm negotiating commitments on anything, so other countries in turn are reluctant to do so. "It's a Catch-22 situation," said the EU's chief climate negotiatior, Artur Runge-Metzger, yesterday. "People are waiting for each other, so it's very hard to blame one country." Dr Runge-Metzger accepted that "the American position is significant in terms of the delay".
Canada, Russia and others
Other industrialised countries such as Canada and Russia have still not set emissions reduction targets, and developing countries, which will create 90 per cent of all future carbon emissions and so must be brought into a future climate treaty, object to this.
Japan
Some that have set targets, such as Japan, are reluctant to agree the sort of financial sums that the developing countries want.
The Europeans
Even the EU pledges to cut its emissions by 20 per cent by 2020, and by 30 per cent if there is a deal at Copenhagen, and to provide substantial finance, has not been enough. The developing countries want such targets increased before they will act themselves.
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Comments
read up people. research. google it. this is all a massive money making scam intended to tax us into submission to our global masters. and guess who score most out of it. al "bloody" gore. the tsar of carbon credits whose film was so biased and full of blatant lies that scientits around the world and leading experts in the field are lining up to lambast it. doesnt stop the education authorities showing it in schools though. illegal propoganda!
people wake up. this is world government coming. and you will all be crying when its too late. the web is a powerful tool. before its censored enlighten yourselves. global warming is a SCAM!
Yes, you are. Anthropogenic CO2 is currently acidifying the oceans to an extent never witnessed in all human history, and when the oceans become sufficiently acidic, most marine life will die.
Once the oceans are dead, most terrestial life will follow suit, (if not before).
Of course, watching motor sport and taking overseas holidays are much more important that the future of life on this planet.
put up or shut up. what do humans contribute to climate change? are we the cause of it? should we be taxed? NO. the corporations who are polluting our planet should be. they make all the money. not us. and while we are on the subject, our bodies are becoming more acidic and acidosis causes cancer. why? because of the crap we throw in our bodies in the form of government approved additives. from who? big business.
our effect on climate is negligible if at all. we can have greener energy, we can have greener cars and we can have greener eating habits. im all for it, but what i am against is being blamed for it when we all know who the culprits really are. they are the people who are against it unless they can profit from it and while we are all filling our tanks with their petrol, eating their shit and buying their lies we have no chance.
it is not our fault.
P.S. Although you do make some good points in this second comment here.
welcome to the new world order people. its here. its happening right before your very eyes and there aint a thing you can do
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/ar
Between 9% to 26% of greenhouse gas forcing is due to CO2. To blame only big business is disingenuous - Who buys their products? We do! So there is a choice, either the government forces businesses to change or our culture needs to change.
Panic 2009 you sound rather panicked, calm down!
but that wont be the case. the governments of the world are out of control. we are being nailed and once they go so far there will be no turning back. wakey wakey
By posting that bogus site, you have demonstrated just how thick you are.
http://www.independent.co.uk/environmen
Either the scientists were mistaken about the disappearance of the Forth oyster in 1957 or the water quality is now more conducive to this particular form of marine life. Either one of these explanations seems to undermine the 'absolute' nature of the pro-AGW argument that you espouse.
By the way, is ocean acidification the new scare story now that the link between CO2 and warming looks extremely tenuous?
Ocean adicification has been discussed amongst the informed for well over a decade (and the possibility was flagged many decades ago.
Tyndall worked out in the mid- nineteenth cetnrury that CO2 absorbs and re-radiates in the IR. Arrhenius worked out the basis for CO2-indiced warming more than 100 years ago. We are now witnessing the fulfilment of their prophesies. The link between CO2 and warming is increasingly confirmed every month that passes. The October Arctic ice cover was the second lowest on record, surpassed only by that of 2007. The CO2 level is the highest ever recorded in human history. What a strange coincidence!
Of course denial or reality and false beliefs have much in common with the Hyrda: it matters not how many times the head is cut off, the denail/false beliefs regrow.
I would love to debate the rest of your points but you make it clear that I'm not worthy of your great intellect. However, let me say that scientists don't prophesise - they hypothesise; prophesises are for prophets (although now that your beliefs are legally recognised as religious rather than scientific, I guess prophesy is the best we can hope for from the proponents of ACC).
By the way, I'm impressed by your Hydra analogy - you clearly have an affinity for myths.
The observed increase in the Earth's temperature is entirely consistent with the 40% increase in the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution, as is the increase in ocean acidity.
I cannot for the life of me understand why people wish to deny the facts and the theories that explain them so well when they can offer no alternative explanations or theories that nake any sense. The only explanation seems to eb that by refusing to acept reality, tehy do not have to deal with it or accept responsibility -the ultimate cop-out: the Earth is being destroyed, but it's not my fault.
It has been noted many times before that the most important lesson of history is that the lesson of history are not learned, and that when alarm bells are sounded people ignore them.
Under ordinary circumstances, ignoring warnings would not be of special consequence, but in the case of environmental meltdown, ignoring the warnings will lead to catastrophe.
If the warnings about CFCs had not been heeded in the 1980s, the Earth would now be uninhabitable do to severe destruction of ozone in the upper atmosphere, i.e. there is a window of opportunity to avert catastrophe, and if that is not taken hte result is likely to be terminal.
Of course it is not those who obstruct appropriate mitigation of CO2 emissions who will suffer the wordst effects, but their progeny.
Interstingly, all therse attempts to hang on to civilisation are doomed anyway, since we are peak resources and about to fall off the resource cliff, some time within the next decade.
But I'm sure there are people who will argue with that well-documented fact, even though they know nothing about the tioopic, just for something to argue about.
My point is because a lot of chalk was laid down over millions of years certainly does not mean the CO2 did not affect the life in the sea.
But let us not allow facts to get in the way of ideology, eh?
Perhaps we can hope to escape the worst excesses of the Global Warming charade and avoiding placing huge bets on imagined and unproven threats.
We have got no money anyway thanks mainly to Government incompetence.
How will the Broon's spinmeisters who only a few weeks ago promoted his view that we had only 50 days to 'save the world' back peddle on this one?
Unrestricted pollution of all sorts is bad, and for the global warming denialists to rant about flawed science is just incredible, would you honestly believe a republican or special interest group paid scientist?
Get real, believe the real scientists, mankind is having an additional impact on the environment over and above natural CO2 emissions.
I'm a lumberjack & I'm OK...................
I cut down trees, I wear high heels
Suspendies and a bra
I wish I'd been a girlie
Just like my dear papa
He cuts down trees...
He's a lumberjack...
The environmentalist movement have abandoned science in favour of a religous crusade over Global Warming.
The Al Gores of this world are just interested in making money and and not actually saving the planet.
The scientists find themselves harangued by environmentalists, ignored by politicians and misrepresented by journalists.
As for the ordinary people. More and more of them realise that Global Warming is ONE BIG SCAM.
Check out http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0
This clearly shows a tomato farmer in England who feeds excess Co2 into his large greenhouse.
A) he is able to work in the the green house with high levels of Co2 all day without adverse effects to his health.
B) the tomato plants do not shrivel up and die.
C) he produces the best tomatoes this side of the English channel
Al Gores Science on Global Warming or whatever you fools are calling it now is proving to be total BS, even Al Gore admits it now, his next film is going to change it to a religion!?!?!
Why does Al Gore only allow preset questions when he talks on stage? Why will he not have open debate? Because he can't, Monckton would wipe the floor with him!
AND YES climate change is real but there is nothing we can do about it. The big yellow thing in the sky controls climate change on this planet like it has always has done. Plus Al Gores graphs are wrong Co2 levels follow heat levels not the other way round.
And mean while, while we debate this and feel guilty about carrier bags and sky boxes that do not have a power off switch, the companies that are chopping down the rain forests, nuclear testing, the governments that are using depleted uranium in wars, dumping toxic waste in the sea of the coast of Somalia, GMO foods, Gene splicing are getting away with the real pollution of our planet!
Why does the news paper continue to publish one sided articles like this?
Come on Ed, this farce can't last for much longer!
This news paper should change its name to 'The Biased'
The team are expected to divert their attention to methane emissions and the frightening theory 'brussel sprouts, their not just for Christmas' there are already reports of children having nightmares at the spread in the use of the highly dangerous vegetable.
A march by the under 11's left wing SAS (Sprouts are Shit) brigade were given the option of cancelling Christmas or their protest & after a highly emotional meeting their letters to Santa were given priority status in any backlog from the effect of the postal strike.
Governments worldwide have announced a tax on sprouts & similar vegetables in the hope this will reduce peoples reliance on this highly dangerous foodstuff, the taxes are to be used to help the worlds politicial leaders in their quest to retire early with a whopping pension.
The Allotments Association have begun a campaign against this taxing of our greens, suggesting governments should consider carrots rather than sticks as there will be nothing for the Sweetpeas to climb.
One Thousand Years Weather, Wind and Water in the Low Countries is a multi-volume standard work by Dutchman Jan Buisman. According to Buisman’s findings, the year 1540 was one with an even more severe summer than was 2003. All over Europe, the heatwave lasted, off and on, for seven months, with parched fields and dried up rivers, such as the Rhine. People in Paris could walk on the river bed of the Seine without getting their feet wet.
In medieval times, such severe weather conditions often led to other disasters. Although the Summer of 2003 is claimed to have led to the untimely death of some 15,000 people in France alone, death and disease in 1540 struck many countries even worse. Drought caused famine, countless deaths from dysentery and other ilnesses caused by lack of safe drinking water, and to large-scale starvation of farm animals. Another disaster usually associated with heatwaves and droughts was fire, often destroying entire villages or even towns such as Harderwijk in 1503. Wooden houses became tinderboxes, dry peat, forests and undergrowth ignited readily and led to massive wildfires.
What's missing? Oh, yes, CO2 from coal fired power stations and SUV's. Strange that.
This was just a brief interlude of warming, before the Little Ice Age rampaged again, destroying Alpine villages with advancing glaciers, producing mass starvation because of crop failure, destroying coastal settlements with higher sea levels than now and producing major loss of life from violent deadly storms.
Let's go back to that shall we?
BTW someusthinkweknow, did you ever do Chemistry at school? Obviously not, because how anyone can believe that a pH of 8.1 is acidic must have been off down the chippy instead of attending lessons. This is another disgraceful deception.
Ten thousand-year-old ice cores and far-away droughts and fires and not enough to convince Americans that their globe is heating. And that’s human nature, really, because very often needed changes are put off until a preponderance of people are directly and injuriously affected. In the US, that just hasn’t happened. If climate change is real, its advocates for change must do a better job of demonstrating it. Look how long many Americans have denied or questioned evolution - and that’s been on the table for 150 years!