EU upbeat but realistic on UN climate change talks

The European Commission is playing down the significance of reaching an accord with the US on future climate change policy, at UN talks in Montreal starting on Monday.

EU environment chief, Stavros Dimas is calling the Canadian talks, “The beginning and not the end” of the debate on future climate change.

A tough fortnight of political discussion, ideological haranguing and backroom dealing awaits Brussels, national governments, environmental groups and business lobbyists as 10,000 delegates descend on Montreal.

The 11th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 11) are meeting in Canada ostensibly to begin discussions on mapping out a future strategy to tackle global warming, post 2012.

On one side are the EU backed 150 or so nations that have signed up to the Kyoto protocol, including the 40 industrialised countries that have pledged to cut CO2 emissions by more than five per cent below 1990 levels by 2012, the year Kyoto ends.

Then there are those industrialised nations, such as the US and Australia, that have rejected Kyoto and its mandatory target setting method in favour of a more voluntary approach that relies on the uptake of new technologies.

And there are the rapidly developing countries such as China, India and Brazil who are against strategies that may impact too heavily on their economic development.

Cutting through the hot air of the two-week long extravaganza, the key issues will be in what format a post 2012 global climate change strategy will take, and how to bring the world’s developing countries on board.

But hopes of achieving an agreement are slim.  The EU and its Kyoto partners have been at loggerheads with the US and its supporters for the last few years, and room for manoeuvre remains limited.

Washington has made it clear that they will not accept any form of mandatory targets.

However the EU remains upbeat, if realistic on what can be expected.

EU environment chief, Stavros Dimas is calling the Montreal talks, “The beginning and not the end…for the debate on future climate change policies.”

“The most controversial issue at Montreal will undoubtedly be the discussion on future international climate cooperation,” said Dimas

The Greek commissioner says that what he wants from the talks is a broad consensus on agreeing the types of measures necessary to combat climate change.

“To make progress we need to focus on key elements of a future regime…broadening participation to all major emitters, stimulating the development and deployment of new technologies, continuing the use of market based mechanisms, and introducing adaptation policies.”

And Dimas is offering a sweetener to those developing countries worried about the impact of mandatory emissions targets if they sign up to a Kyoto style pact post 2012.

“We do not think that developing countries should or indeed could, take on the same commitments as industrialised countries…we can design a system with different types of participation.”

Just what these different types of participation would be remain unclear, but non mandatory targets ceilings, with the option of selling CO2 credits to the industrialised world if targets are met, has been one suggestion.

All parties are expected to agree to strengthen the UN strategy of technology cooperation and transfer for developing nations, the so called Clean Development Mechanism. 

Dimas is also expected to push the EU’s leadership in all things climate change at Montreal.  From championing Kyoto, to taking the lead in setting emissions cuts and in implementing its groundbreaking CO2 emissions trading scheme, Dimas says he will re-assert the EU’s leadership in climate change policy.

But a number of EU signatories to Kyoto are struggling to meet their CO2 reduction commitments, and could be tempted to look again at the US new technology and voluntary agreement package.

The UK, current EU presidency holders and chief European negotiator for the Montreal talks sparked condemnation recently after suggesting that mandatory EU targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions could be scrapped.

UK Green MEP Caroline Lucas accused London of preparing to back away from its commitment to replace the Kyoto protocol with a binding international treaty.

Lucas says that the UK is fond of reminding the world that it exercises global leadership on tackling climate change.

“The reality, however couldn’t be further from the truth,” said Lucas adding that “Far from exercising global leadership, the UK is manifestly failing on a number of counts.”

And the European Parliament’s rapporteur on climate change, Swedish MEP Anders Wijkman believes that even if a deal with the US and its partners looks unlikely, the EU should endeavour not to leave the talks empty handed.

“Developing countries are enormously important,” says Wijkman, “I suggest that the EU should enter into a strategic partnership with countries like China, India, Brazil and South Africa.”

Wijkman suggests that the EU should broker an agreement with these countries to pay for many of the upfront costs of investing in clean technology.

[Technological] leapfrogging is possible…developing countries do not have to repeat our mistakes. We have to think big,” says Wijkman.

The UN-sponsored COP 11 climate change talks begin on November 28 in Montreal, Canada, and finish on December 9.

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