The road ahead for the Kyoto Protocol

The United Nations says that the Kyoto Protocol is generally seen as an important first step towards a truly global emission reduction regime that will stabilise GHG emissions, and provides the essential architecture for any future international agreement on climate change. By the end of the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol in 2012, a new international framework needs to have been negotiated and ratified that can deliver the stringent emission reductions the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has clearly indicated are needed.

According to Climate Action Tracker the aggregated emission-reduction pledges of all Parties in the UN climate convention fall far short of what is needed to get the world on track for limiting global warming to 2°C and 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. Both of these warming limits are mentioned in the Cancun Agreements. Similar emission levels are needed in 2020 to meet both temperature targets: Global emissions need to be at 40-44 billion tonnes CO₂ equivalent per year by 2020, and to steeply decline afterwards. The Climate Action Tracker added up the international1 reduction target and pledges of individual countries, and has estimated that global emissions in 2020 would be 54 billion tonnes CO₂e/year in 2020: A gap of 10-14 billion tonnes remains to reach the reduction level required.

Climate Action Network (CAN) demands that the UN at the Durban conference in 2011 secures a second commitment period for the Kyoto Protocol, and thus preserves the only legally binding instrument with emission reduction targets and timetables for developed countries. KP architectural elements are crucial to ensure that mitigation commitments are legally binding and have environmental integrity. (For details of the Kyoto architecture.)

At the same time CAN demands that the UN secures a mandate to negotiate a legally binding instrument under the Climate Convention to be adopted no later than 2015 and come into force by the end of the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol. By 2015 at the latest, the commitments and actions of all Parties, while respecting the principles and provisions of the Convention, should be inscribed in legally binding instruments. In a letter to EU environmental ministers, CAN Europe argues that the European Union is central in shaping the direction of the global climate change regime.

"We have noted that the EU has always had the most impact in international climate negotiations when it has led from the front – by unilaterally adopting clear, ambitious positions, well in time. The Kyoto Protocol is more than just a legal protocol, it holds symbolic meaning for developing countries – and its downfall would provoke outcry and blame. CAN Europe believes that it is in the EU's own interest to save the Kyoto Protocol. Failing to do so will leave climate laggards sitting in quiet satisfaction while the EU takes the blame for destroying the only legally binding set of global climate rules. The only way the EU can put pressure on the largest emitters is to build an inclusive movement of the majority of the world's countries; the EU cannot do this if it abandons the Kyoto Protocol."

Reinhold Pape

References: http://www.climateactiontracker.org/ and http://climatenetwork.org/sites/default/files/CAN_durban_expectations_september2011_web.pdf

Climate ChangeEditorial

In this issue

Principles of the Kyoto Protocol

The Kyoto Protocol is an international agreement linked to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The major feature of the Kyoto Protocol is that it sets binding targets for 37 industrialised countries and the European community for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. These amount to an average of five per cent against 1990 levels over the five-year period 2008-2012.

Particle pollution killing people

In many cities air pollution is reaching levels that threaten people's health according to a new compilation of air quality data by the World Heath Organization (WHO). The information includes data from nearly 1100 cities across 91 countries, including capital cities and cities with more than 100,000 residents.

Cruise line fined for breaching sulphur rules

A cruise ship operator has been fined EUR 30,000 for contravening European Union rules on the sulphur content of marine fuel. The 88,000 gross tonne Disney Magic was inspected this month while at berth in the Italian port of Naples, and it was found the ship was using a bunker fuel with a sulphur content in excess of an EU regulation that requires ships at berth to use fuel with a sulphur content of no more than 0.10 per cent, unless they are scheduled to be in port for less than two hours.

High ozone levels in Europe

The EU long-term objective to protect human health from ozone damage was exceeded in all EU member states and in most of the other reporting European countries at least once during summer 2010, according to a new report by the European Environment Agency (EEA). As in previous years, the most widespread high concentrations occurred in the Mediterranean area. However, areas of western and central Europe experienced higher ozone concentrations than in 2009.

Climate change will increase ozone-related deaths

Belgium, France, Spain and Portugal will see the biggest climate-induced increase in ozone-related deaths over the next 60 years, according to a new study, presented at the European Respiratory Society's Annual Congress in Amsterdam on 27 September.

The research is part of the Climate-TRAP project and its health impact assessment led by Professor Bertil Forsberg from Umeå University in Sweden.

California rules give great benefits

Switching to low sulphur fuels in shipping can provide greater reductions in air pollutant emissions than previously assumed. Carbon dioxide emissions also drop when ships slow down because of the more expensive fuel.

Sulphur emissions from shipping to be slashed

EU ship fuel sulphur standards are to be aligned with international standards, meaning that the global limit should come down to 0.5 per cent in 2020, and the stricter limit applied in sulphur emission control areas is to be further lowered to 0.1 per cent in 2015.

Coal-fired plants hinder German climate targets

If all the 20 planned coal-fired power plant projects in Germany are realised, they would together emit more than 140 million tonnes of carbon dioxide annually from 2050 onwards. This would make it impossible to achieve the climate targets of the German government.

Carbon dioxide emissions up 5.8 per cent last year

Global emissions of carbon dioxide reached 33 billion tonnes in 2010, and are now 45 per cent higher than in 1990.

Global emissions of the main greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO₂) did a full swing after the recession, growing more than 5 per cent in 2010, according to the report "Long-term trend in global CO₂ emissions", published on 21 September. This is the highest increase in the last two decades and only fuels the climate crisis.

Finding new ambition levels

Significant additional emission reductions and accompanying environmental improvements can be achieved in Europe by 2020. Health benefits alone far outweigh the extra costs for emission control.

Berlin leads fight on air pollution, Rome bottom

A long-term strategy to reduce car use and limit high emitters gave Berlin the top position in a ranking of the performance of seventeen European cities in combatting air pollution.

Proposal: Equal tax for all fuels

A proposal for a revision of the EU Energy Tax Directive, launched in April by the European Commission, has triggered strong reactions from some of the EU member states, including giants like the UK and Germany.

Not efficient enough

The European Commission do not believe that their own proposal for a new Energy Efficiency Directive will be enough to meet the 20 per cent energy savings target by 2020.