Foundations
Reactions to
climate change are happening at many different levels across many different
fields of experience. In order to traverse the various layers of GHG mitigation efforts I will compare
the relative success of the global climate change regime (the UNFCCC, Kyoto
Protocol, the COP meetings) against gains made by the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative and the Chicago Climate Exchange.
This will help determine the state of climate change mitigation
policy-making. Second, I will take the
results of a survey of climate change academics I performed during my internship
with Youth Climate Report and use those results to determine the state of interaction between climate science and policy.
My
internship this past summer, May-August 2012, was with Youth Climate Report, a
film project based out of Toronto. The project was partnered with the UNEP to
create movies that were purely interviews between students and
climate/sustainability scientists. The
movies were then screened at high profile UNEP conferences such as Rio+20 and COP 17 in Durban. My job was to contact research programs and
convince them to partner with us. As a
result I was able to speak with a lot of scientists and academics who work on climate change.
Framework
Framework
From
that point I was able to ask each climate or sustainability scientist (who was willing)
a five question survey. The survey was
designed to acquire their thoughts about the global climate regime and its
effectiveness compared to regional and local initiatives. However, it also had the indirect effect of
revealing whether they were familiar with climate politics or implemented
policies (UNFCCC, Kyoto Protocol, and regional/local initiatives). The questions were:
1. Do you believe the Kyoto Protocol and its mechanisms
(carbon markets, the CDM, and JI) have been adequately successful in mitigating
climate change?
2. Do you believe the UNFCCC and its process has been
adequately successful thus far in mitigating climate change?
3. Has the UNFCCC adequately shaped its climate policy
around science? (from the IPCC or any other source)
4. Do you think that regional or local initiatives are
being more successful at creating or implementing tangible solutions to climate
change?
5. Are there some regional/municipal/NGO initiatives or
programs that you like in particular?
The questions were created in a
way that anyone answering could expound on a thought or simply answer "yes" or "no". The only question that could not be answered
with a simple affirmative was number five.
There
were a few problems I ran into while administering the survey. A few individuals did not like the word
‘believe’ in the first two questions. It
indicated an unscientific line of questioning to them and I’ll admit it was an
oversight on my part. Second, some did
not understand how to conceptualize 'adequately successful'. My purpose was to ask whether
policymakers had done enough to ensure dangerous climate change will not happen
for the time being or whether they are acting too slowly. Many
answered the question with a very quick no but they were indicating that
climate change had not been stopped yet so more had to be done. There was no relative temporal judgment on
their part. For these reasons the survey
is flawed. It still gives some very
illuminating details though, that come through in the elaborated answers and knowledge
of the various academics.
The
first part of the paper will be taken up with analysis of climate change
mitigation and adaptation experiments contrasted with the global UN framework. There are 3 regional/multilateral initiatives
that I take into consideration:
1. Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative
2. Chicago Climate Exchange
3. Major Economies Forum
All of these examples come from Climate
Governance at the Crossroads by Matthew Hoffman as well as the bare bones
of the question regarding the comparison of the global climate regime to regional/local efforts. Once the regional initiatives are compared to
the global regime the viewpoints of the scientists will be brought in to give a
greater scope of understanding for how policy fits into thinking on climate
change.
The
second part of the paper will focus on the aforementioned survey of climate
change and sustainability specialists.
The survey will be set against the background of the climate governance
experiments and UNFCCC process. From
that a general critique of the scientific method, science’s role in policymaking,
and scientists' and academics' understanding of climate change policy will be
advanced. This will be a minor part of
the paper considering the small sample size and weak survey questions. It should be viewed as the building blocks
for a stronger methodology along the same line of inquiry.
Introduction
The
UNFCCC has failed to produce a treaty of significant weight to fully mitigate
climate change. A sustainable society is
still out of reach and climate science is under predicting the rate of change. In light of this, climate governance
experiments have been created in anticipation of, complementary to, or
independent of the current global treaty system. The aim of many of these organizations is to
quantify and mitigate emissions, something the UNFCCC process has been only
partially successful at. It is
consistently voiced within portions of the American government and public that
large government initiatives just promote big government and smaller steps must
be made. Many of these new climate
governance models involve voluntary participation by members of the private
sector. These are the free market models
many are calling for. I aim to analyze
the effectiveness of some of them and parse out where private and public
intervention is necessary or beneficial.
In
addition, some of the experiments are run by regional governments or are
partner initiatives between international organizations and municipalities or
private sector entities. The purpose and
effectiveness of these partnerships must be analyzed as well. The different role of IOs, such as the UN,
within the global treaty process versus private and public sector partnerships
should be understood and the effectiveness of each one compared. Strengths and weaknesses for each role can be
identified as well as roles for synergy within the organization (such as the
UN) or with other projects (such as the RGGI).
Finally,
the perceptions and thoughts of climate change and sustainability specialists
must be considered. The influence that
these individuals have, particularly scientists, on policy could (and should) be very
influential. Therefore, understanding
their thoughts on the matter is important for informing the public about what climate change is and moving forward with effective policy.
This
paper will show that climate governance experiments are successful and
important pieces to mitigating climate change, especially in light of a weak
global treaty framework. (In fact, they are necessary to the success of the global framework since the global mechanisms involved are networks of regional organizations/initiatives to some extent.) However, they
are not enough and must be complemented by multilateral intergovernmental
processes that provide coherence throughout the world with regards to GHG
mitigation and climate change adaptation.
In general, climate change and sustainability specialists agree that the
UNFCCC and Kyoto Protocol have not done enough to mitigate climate change and
regional/local initiatives are currently being more effective. They do not seem well informed about the
actual process though and are confused about or ignorant of policy in
general. A lack of willingness to attach
opinion to or engage policy seems to come from the scientific method’s
necessity of remaining impartial. This
however prevents active participation of those whose opinions matter the most in
the climate change debate. This lack of
engagement seems to be a partial problem with the global treaty process.
The Chicago
Climate Exchange
In
2003, two Northwestern professors received a grant to develop a carbon market
for private industry in the United
States.
They partnered with various professionals and corporations and from that
the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX) was born.
The CCX originally had thirteen participants in 2003: American Electric
Power, Baxter International Inc., the City of Chicago,
DuPont, Ford Motor Co., International Paper,
Manitoba Hydro Corp., MeadWestvaco Corp., Motorola Inc., STMicroelectrics,
Stora Enso North America, Temple-Inland Inc., and Waste Management Inc. Since that time the total number of
participants (in the direct emissions portion) has grown to 84. “Participants include major corporations,
utilities, and financial institutions with activities in all 50 states, 8
Canadian provinces, and 16 countries.” (Chicago
Climate Exchange)
There
have been two phases to the Chicago Climate Exchange thus far (before it was
sold to InterContinental Exchange and merged with various other cap and trade
programs). I will be focusing on these
two phases. Phase I ran from 2003 to
2006 and Phase II ran from 2007 to 2010.
What separates them are the starting point for the calculation of baseline emissions. The baseline for Phase I had
to be the organization's average annual emissions from 1998-2001, while the
Phase II baseline could either be the average annual emissions from 1998-2001
or the single year of 2000. This gave
those entering the CCX at a later date greater leeway in determining their
baseline emissions, allowing them an easier path to meeting their emissions
reduction targets. This should not take
away from the magnitude of the CCX’s success however.
Total
baseline emissions, for which the CCX was ultimately responsible, came to 700
million Gt CO2e. Every
member, Phase I or II, had to be 6% below their baseline by 2010. Most members met that goal and as a whole the
CCX surpassed the compliance requirement considerably.
From
2003 to 2006, collectively known as Phase I, there were between 12 and 18
members in excess of the yearly economic growth provision level and from 2007
to 2010. During Phase II there were between 8 and 12 above the provision level. With between 82 and 86 participants total
however, at any given time, the errors of such offenders were easily outweighed
by the clear success of the rest of the field.
For instance, the emissions baseline for 2006, with 85 participants, was
552,085,500 tons of CO2, the total compliance requirement was
530,015,200 tons of CO2, the total verified emissions for 2006 were
468,661,200 tons of CO2, and the emissions in excess were 180,400
tons of CO2. (CCX, 2011a) The verified reduction
from baseline is 83,423,900 tons of CO2 and the verified reduction
from the compliance requirement is 61,173,600 tons of CO2. With the total amount of emissions in excess
for all participants in the program in 2006 coming to 180,400 tons of CO2,
the excess makes up 0.22% of emissions cuts from baseline and 0.29% of
emissions cuts from the compliance requirement.
It can thus be determined that the failures of the CCX in relation to
its established goals are negligible, since the average overage for all 8 years
is 0.28% of emissions cuts from baseline and 0.36% of emissions cuts from the
program-wide compliance requirement. In
fact, at its lowest, additional emissions reductions under the CCX were 69% of
total reductions, in 2007. At its
highest they accounted for 98%, in 2009.
Considering that the CCX was responsible for 550 million tons of CO2
during Phase I and 700 million tons of CO2 during Phase II, total
reductions of verified emissions for the 4 years of Phase I average out to 465
million tons while the 4 years of Phase II average out to 550 million tons. That’s a reduction of 85 million tons for
Phase I and 150 million tons for Phase II, or put another way, a 15% reduction
for Phase I and a 21% reduction for Phase II.
These are going to be the measures against which we will test the RGGI
and the Kyoto Protocol.
The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative
The
RGGI is a compact, originally formed between 10 New
England states, to regulate the greenhouse gas emissions coming
from their power sectors. Since its
inception it has lost one member, New
Jersey, beginning on January 1st, 2012. (Martin,
2010) That is as a result of political
reasons however, not the success or failure of the initiative to achieve its
goals. (Elperin, 2011; Baxter, 2011; Gruen, 2010) The initiative regulates 211
power facilities in nine states.
Its current members are comprised of Connecticut,
Delaware, Maryland,
Massachusetts, New
Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, and Vermont.
The
RGGI operates through an emissions allowance auction system. Allotted allowances for the current year are auctioned in predetermined amounts quarterly. Half of the allotment of total future
emissions allowances for each year for the next four years can be
auctioned. Initial asking prices are
determined “based on the Consumer Price Index, or 80-percent of the current
market price of the particular RGGI allowance vintage being auctioned.” (RGGI,
2008) The first control period lasted
for three years from 2009-2011, after which it was decided in 2012 whether
unsold allowances from previous years would be carried over into the new
market. (RGGI , 2008; RGGI, 2012b) Each
state has its own way of determining the number the allowances it will make
available for auction. Their methods are
defined in state statutes and regulations. (RGGI, 2012a)
The
entirety of the RGGI comprises an emissions market totaling 188 million tons of
CO2. This is ~29% of the size
of the Chicago Climate Exchange (at an initial ~700 million tons of CO2
for Phase II), making it substantially smaller.
What is more important however, for determining systematic effectiveness
at least, is understanding the percentage of total emissions cut. For the first two 3-year periods the
emissions baseline will remain steady and it will also be the compliance
requirement. After 2014, the baseline
will decrease by 2.5% every year. Each state
has its own baseline set within the Memorandum of Understanding and its
subsequent amendments, which are as stated: Connecticut, 10,695,036 tons;
Delaware, 7,559,787 tons; Maine, 5,948,902 tons; Maryland, 37,503,983 tons; Massachusetts,
26,660,204 tons; New Hampshire, 8,620,460 tons; New Jersey, 22,892,730 tons;
New York, 64,310,805; Rhode Island, 2,659,239 tons; Vermont, 1,225,830 tons.
Not
every allowance is sold however. Some
were not offered at auction and some were offered but not sold. Of those not offered some were sold at a
fixed price, transferred from state set-aside accounts, and some remained in
set-aside accounts. Of those in
set-aside accounts a portion were retired.
For each state the portion of allowances remaining each year was
different. The number of allowances
retired, and therefore tons of CO2 mitigated, and their percentage
of the allowance budget per state is as followed: Connecticut, 6,802,914 tons,
21.2%; Delaware, 6,628,589 tons, 29.2%; Maine, 3,172 tons, 1.8%; Maryland, 6,501,404
tons, 5.8%; Massachusetts, 16,831,266 tons, 21%; New Hampshire, 452 tons, <.01%; New Jersey, 15,706,238 tons, 22.9%;
New York, 43,829,771 tons, 22.7%; Rhode Island, 1,706,721 tons, 21.4%; Vermont,
792,092 tons, 21.5%. On the whole the
RGGI states reduced emissions from their power sectors by an average of 16.76%
for the First Control Period, with New
Hampshire dragging the average down by two percentage
points. (RGGI, 2012b) On the whole
emissions were reduced by 17.5% from their baseline. This compares favorably with the outcome of
the Chicago Climate Exchange’s Phase I.
The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change &
Kyoto Protocol
Created
in 1992, The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the
subsequent Kyoto Protocol (1997) were international legal attempts to limit GHG
emissions and thereby stem the advance of climate change. Thus far there has been little success by
either of these regimes though in achieving their aim of stopping climate change. With the
release of the last IPCC Assessment Report, AR4, in 2007, there also came
warnings that climate change may be increasing at a rate faster than current
emissions scenarios account for (Canadell, et al, 2007; Hansen, et al, 2008). As a result, progress made through the Kyoto
Protocol has been considered crucial in mitigating the effects of climate
change.
The
Kyoto Protocol divides signatory countries into two groups, Annex I and
non-Annex I. Annex I consists of
developed nations which are required to have binding emissions reductions
targets and to fund mitigation and adaptation measures in non-Annex I
countries. Non-Annex I states need to
improve their capacity for sustainable development; adaptation; and put in
place adequate measurement, reporting, and verification systems for GHG
emissions. Annex I countries are divided
further into transitional economies, former Eastern block states transitioning
to market economies, and developed states: Western Europe, the United States
(not a signatory to the treaty), Canada, Australia, and Japan.
Annex
A of the Protocol establishes the baseline emissions for each state. Baseline indicates the point from which
reductions will be measured. For example,
if the baseline is 1990, a country emitted 15 GT CO2e in 1990, and they had a
reduction target of 85% they would need to bring their CO2e emissions down to
85% of 15GT CO2e, or 12.75 GT.
Annex B determines the percentage a state needs to reduce CO2e
emissions by to meet their requirements. (85% in the previous example.)
For our purposes we will be examining emissions increases and
decreases excluding and including Land Use, Land Use Change, and Forestry
(LULUCF). This is because, though the
RGGI only has emissions decreases as a result of measured emissions cuts at
power plants, the CCX allows offsets to be used to offset emissions. Therefore including LULUCF runs parallel
to the CCX and excluding LULUCF runs parallel to the RGGI, allowing comparison
between the Kyoto Protocol and both markets.
There are a greater number of
states who have reduced GHG emissions than increased them. When one averages out total GHG reductions across Annex I members, one comes to a decrease in emissions of 10.24%. There is also a
reduction in GHG emissions when including LULUCF. A small change can be noticed with a greater
portion of Annex I countries reducing their emissions load. The average percentage of GHG decrease here
comes to 19.85%. If Canada was still
a signatory, the percentage without LULUCF would have been cut to 9.745% and
with LULUCF to 18.755%, while if the US had ratified the Protocol and
Canada was a still signatory the percentage without LULUCF would have been cut
to 9.35% and with LULUCF to 17.67%. This
does not take into account solid emissions reductions from baseline however,
just the effort of each state, presumably, to reduce its emissions
proportionally to its emission load (it does not consider the tonnage of GHGs mitigated). Actual
emissions matter because while proportional differences in change might be
considered when determining what is just, actual emissions matter when
determining how effective the Protocol’s efforts at mitigation of climate
change are.
When
considering the impact of GHG emissions one must take the sum of three years of
baseline emissions and compare them to the three years, 2007-2010, of emissions
data for Annex I countries available from the UNFCCC. The 11 Annex I signatories with the highest
GHG emissions (in descending order) are the Russian Federation, Japan,
Germany, Canada[1], the
United Kingdom and Northern Ireland, Australia, France, Italy, Poland, the
Ukraine, and Spain. Each of these states
has over 1 billion tons of CO2e emissions, with no other state over
a billion. Russia
has over 6 billion, Japan
has 3 billion, and Germany
and Canada
have 2 billion.[2] The sum of these 11 countries actual emissions
comes to 23,452,363,304.8 tCO2e, with Canada,
and 21,340,039,592.99 tCO2e without Canada. The total baseline emissions for all Annex I
states for three years, including Canada,
is 37,831,972,719 tCO2e, and without Canada is 36,049,977,333 tCO2e. Total actual emissions for Annex I states for
the 2008-2010 period comes to 30,126,335,523.48 tCO2e, with Canada, and 28,014,011,811.67 tCO2e
without Canada.
(UNFCCC, 2012b; UNFCCC 2012c). The sum
of emissions for the aforementioned 11 countries (10 without Canada) obviously
makes up the majority of the emissions budget for Annex I states, coming to
83.7% with Canada and 70.8% without Canada, while only being 11:39, or 28.29% of the population with Canada, and
10:38, or 26.31% without Canada. These
states obviously have a disproportionate affect on the perceived success or
failure of the Kyoto Protocol; therefore, their emissions must be more closely
scrutinized.
Of the 11 top
emitting states Russia
has the largest baseline emissions, the largest actual emissions for the
2008-2012 period, and the second largest average reduction from baseline. This fact is interesting in and of itself
because Russia's
main exports are fossil fuels, with oil exports accounting for 35% of total
goods exports, and exports ensuring a federal budget surplus equivalent to .8%
of Russian GDP. Without oil revenue or
expenditures the federal budget would have a deficit of 9.6% Russian GDP. (Ulatov,
Smits, Titov, Sulla, Mansfield & Emelyanova, 2012; Yergin, 2011) Under Annex B to the Kyoto Protocol Russia had
guaranteed a reduction of 0% by 2012.
This would have stagnated Russia’s GHG emissions at 1990
levels. As it stands however, Russia has emissions below baseline by 34.4%, coming in below
its target by just as much. What seems to be Russia's success,
comparatively, should not be viewed as such however. The main reason
for Russia’s success has been an artificially high baseline born out of the Soviet
Union’s economy, which was still in place in 1990. With the collapse of the Soviet Union the
Russian economy plummeted, allowing Russia to increase its emissions
while remaining below baseline. (Charap, 2010)
The country with
the greatest percentage reduction is the Ukraine with a 57.7% average
reduction from baseline. The Ukraine, the
tenth largest emitter within the Annex I states, had an Annex B commitment of
reductions of 0% from baseline. Ukrainian GHG emissions reductions come to a
total of 1,592,732,338 tCO2e, about half of Russia’s
reductions. It should be noted however that
the Ukraine
went through a deep recession during this period where some Ukrainian officials
were suggesting the country cut its gas consumption by half, though President
Viktor Yushchenko at that time suggested they would only have to reduce it by 20
to 25%. (Polityuk & Zawadzki, 2009)
This could account for a good portion of the emissions decreases. A more important
fact is the artificially high baseline the Ukraine
has as a result of the dissolution of the USSR in 1990. This creates a situation where the Ukraine, like Russia, does not have to reduce emissions
to reach its baseline reductions. (Baird, 2012)
If one averages
out the percentage of average emissions increases and decreases from baseline by
the top 10 countries, excluding Canada
as a result of its withdrawal from the Protocol, one receives an average
reduction of 14.85%. The average of
their Annex B commitments however, comes to a reduction of 4.4%, overshooting
their requirement by 10.4%. The average
in this case is pulled down by: Italy, with a 1.1% decrease; Japan, with a 1%
decrease; Australia, with a 0% decrease; and Spain, with a 29.5% increase. The countries that have contributed to the
decrease in emissions from baseline the most are: the Ukraine, with a 57.7%
decrease; the Russian Federation, with a 34.4% decrease; Poland, with a 30%
decrease; Germany, with a 23.7% decrease; the United Kingdom and Northern
Ireland, with a 23.1% decrease; and France, with a 7% decrease. These six countries carry the Kyoto Protocol’s
emissions decreases on their back. This
is a far cry from the requirement for a decrease to 350ppm atmospheric CO2
to prevent dangerous climate change. (Hansen, Sato, Karecha, Beerling, Berner,
Mason-Delmotte, Pagani, & Raymo, 2008)
Also, Annex B commitments were written prior to 2008, meaning that
data from influential sources supporting reduction of GHGs to greater than
current emissions reduction levels were not available.
From the perspective
of its members meeting their reduction requirement the Kyoto Protocol could be
viewed as a success. Enough members have
met their requirements to go beyond the average percentage of reduction
commitments to 9.475% without LULUCF and with LULUCF to 19.85%. This
means the Kyoto Protocol was well over its targets for emissions reductions and
it can not be faulted for being a failure based on achieving its set goals.
A
major drawback of the Kyoto Protocol however, is its failure to include non-Annex I
countries in emission reduction requirements, from the aspect of keeping CO2
levels at or below 350ppm. The mantra of
differentiated responsibility, while certainly admirable from a justice
perspective, does not take into account the actual physics behind climate
change. States such as China
and India have emissions
that now dwarf most developed countries, with China
surpassing the United States,
the world’s former leading emitter of GHGs. In order to get back to 350 developing nations need emissions reduction goals as strong as developed states and across the board reductions need to be increased greatly.
Comparison of the RGGI, CCX, and Kyoto Protocol
In
order to prevent dangerous climate change it has been determined that a
decrease of atmospheric CO2 to 350ppm is necessary. This is not achieved by the emissions
reduction requirements for any of the of the emissions reduction
agreements. Neither the RGGI, CCX, nor
Kyoto Protocol has targets that are ambitious enough to bring emissions down to
zero and then reduce the pre-existing atmospheric CO2 load. This ensures that no matter what success they
have it will not be to the level necessary to prevent dangerous climate change
as determined by James Hansen, NASA’s leading climate change scientist. Disregarding this fact however and simply taking into account the merits of each system on its own brings out a more nuanced
perspective.
The CCX is a
private system reliant on voluntary membership from its participant
organizations and institutions. The RGGI
is a regional public system run through 9 (previously 10) states, of the United States,
that is voluntary for state admission but mandatory for the power
companies/plants that are within the state.
Finally, Annex I of the Kyoto Protocol is voluntary for the countries
which sign the treaty but the emissions caps are then binding for the
industries within the country, in whatever way they can meet the cap legally. All three systems met their caps
sufficiently, surpassing their mandatory requirements by 1% if not more. However, the CCX ended up being the program
in which emissions were reduced the most from the compliance requirement. Whether this is due to the regulations
governing how CO2e limitations can be met, through low emissions
caps, easily established offset projects and credit disbursement, or its voluntary
nature, I can not say at this
time. The CCX is also the most program
compliant. The RGGI is the next
most successful. The RGGI had 97%, or 206 out of 211, of its
participating power plants meet their emissions reduction targets. (Ziegler,
2012) This is near perfect; yet the RGGI
is a mandatory program for a regulated industry, the power industry. So, the RGGI’s lack of success in comparison
to the CCX could easily be due to its involuntary nature. RGGI’s goals were also not as ambitious as
the CCX’s. The CCX governed ~700 million
tons of CO2e while the RGGI only governed ~188 million tons CO2e. So, the footprint the RGGI governed was not nearly as impressive as that of the CCX, most likely because the
states participating in the RGGI only wanted to regulate their power
industries. The Kyoto Protocol had the
lowest emissions caps and the least amount of compliance. Only 20 out of 36, or 55.6%, of participating
states were compliant with there emissions reduction requirements. This is most likely because the industries
that were being regulated were incredibly varied, taking up the entire
economies of the participating states, and the reduction commitments for the actors
within the states, the aforementioned industries, were involuntary parties to
the treaty. Given the various countries
that signed the Protocol were responsible for producing the regulation and
enforcement necessary to bring emissions levels down but this is more difficult
with large sprawling states and bureaucracies than with smaller voluntary
entities such as corporations.
The Protocol’s
redeeming factor however is in its ambition.
The sheer size of the emissions load it governs is spectacular. Under the Kyoto Protocol emissions were
decreased by 7,761,986,969.77 tons of CO2e below baseline, far surpassing
anything the CCX or the RGGI accomplished.
The entirety of the emissions governed by the CCX, 700 million CO2e,
came to 9% of the amount of emissions mitigated below baseline by the
Protocol. The total of emissions
governed by the RGGI, ~188 million tons CO2e, comes to 2.4% of the
emissions reduced below baseline. From
this standpoint the Kyoto Protocol dwarfs the CCX and RGGI revealing the importance
of a transnational carbon mitigation framework in dealing with climate change.
Even for those who are creating subnational
systems for reducing carbon emissions through cap and trade there is a desire
for national and transnational systems. For
instance, “Franz Litz, one of the RGGI’s designers, recalled that when it was
initially proposed by Governor George Pataki of NewYork, the response from some
governors was tepid precisely because a federal system was desirable.”
(Hoffman, 2011) There is greater capital
in national and global markets which ensuring higher profits.
Standards and crediting systems can be uniform throughout the system
allowing for easy access to all markets and greater movement of capital between
various parts of the country or world.
As it is now, there are various crediting and oversight agencies
that oversee the various systems.
Movement of credits between them requires bridges to be built between
the programs; while a uniform system would get rid of middlemen, any excess
fees, and complicated webs of rules and regulations.
For these
reasons a transnational or national system, preferably transnational, would be
a much better system than many varied subnational/regional systems. A transnational system allows for greater
reduction in larger amounts of CO2e.
Involuntary systems ensure larger amounts of CO2 will be mitigated since
voluntary systems only ensure some corporations/institutions will participate. This makes voluntary or industry specific cap
and trade systems look better in terms of the degree of compliance their
participants have with the framework. It
also ensures that larger caps can be met.
However, leaving out a large portion of the national carbon market by
not regulating large portions of the economy skews
those numbers. Large transnational,
nationally instituted cap and trade/carbon mitigation treaties allow for all
industries across the world to be regulated ensuring the broadest possible
mitigation measures are taken.
This does not
mean that any of these has been a success however. Success in this case is termed as mitigating
climate change. If dangerous climate
change is actually prevented at a level of 350ppm CO2 then we have already
passed the barrier for preventing dangerous climate change and anything that
does not eliminate anthropogenic GHG emissions and enhance carbon sinks is only
being used to make the world feel like something is being done.
The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change or the
Major Economies Forum
So what type of
transnational organization works best to mitigate GHG emissions? Right now there are two large organizations
that have tasked themselves with taking on the challenge of climate change, the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Major
Economies Forum (MEF). The UNFCCC is a
collective of representatives from the various states tasked with legislating
solutions to climate change while the MEF is a body consisting of the world’s states with
the largest economies formed under the auspices of creating solutions and
furthering agreements on climate change as a supplement to the UNFCCC.
The UNFCCC was
established in 1992 at the United Nations Conference on Environment and
Development, or the Earth Summit, in Rio
de Janeiro. The
body was tasked with taking into consideration the latest information on
climate change and using it to develop policy aimed at mitigating climate change. Since that time it has produced important
documents like the Kyoto Protocol and the Bali Roadmap. Both of these documents are cornerstones of
global climate change mitigation policy.
There are complaints that not enough has been done though. Some argue (such as I just have) that the
Kyoto Protocol was too weak to prevent dangerous climate change or that the
enforcement and regulating systems for the Protocol are not strong enough or
implemented correctly. Some are
disappointed because there has not been a follow up treaty to continue on to a
new phase of the Kyoto Protocol, with previous emissions caps being maintained. The 15th Conference of Parties to
the UNFCCC in Copenhagen,
or COP 15, had been hailed as a time when great accomplishments were going to
be made with a new addition to the Kyoto Protocol bringing in stricter
emissions cuts. President Obama was
supposed to work to ensure the US
became a participant to the global treaty and to ensure that equitable deals
were made between developing nations, like China
and India,
and the developed world. These hopes
were dashed and have continued to elude optimists through COP 16 in Cancun and
COP 17 in Durban. The Kyoto Protocol has been a move towards
preventing climate change, as small as its efforts may be though. Mitigation is better than nothing.
The MEF is not a carbon mitigation
mechanism, unlike every other program I’ve mentioned. The MEF was created in the run up to COP 15
to further the negotiations. The forum
held many meetings before COP 15 to ensure they had plans in place to present
at the conference. The MEF consists of Australia, Brazil,
Canada, China, the European Union, France, Germany,
India, Indonesia, Italy,
Japan, Korea, Mexico,
Russia, South Africa, the United
Kingdom, and the United States. Its goal is to develop additional support to
UNFCCC and supplement efforts to mitigate GHGs.
Its main way of doing so, thus far, has been creating Technology Action
Plans, designed to draw together the leading knowledge on various types of
energy technology and create methods for how each system can be developed and
instituted. Every nation that
participated contributed to one of the plans.
The document each nation worked on was: Canada,
advanced vehicles; Brazil
and Italy, bioenergy; United States, with
two separate reports: 1. buildings sector energy efficiency and 2. industrial
energy efficiency; Australia and the United Kingdom, carbon capture, use, and
storage; the International Energy Agency, global gaps in clean energy research,
development, and demonstration; India and Japan, high-efficiency, low-emissions
coal; France, marine energy; Italy and Korea, smart grids; Germany and Spain,
solar energy; and Germany, Spain, and Denmark, wind energy. After their creation the Technology Action
Plans were presented at COP 15 in Durban. Following COP 15 the parties were responsible
for actually implementing the plans and helping others to implement them.
The one Technology Action Plan that
has been acted upon is Germany
and Spain’s solar energy and
Germany, Spain, and Denmark’s wind energy plan. From the Technology Action Plan came the
joint effort of Germany, Spain, and Denmark to create a Global Solar
and Wind Atlas. The resulting project
has become one of the largest MEF initiatives through the Clean Energy
Ministerial (which I will explain later).
The Global Solar and Wind Atlas is supposed to provide start-up solar
and wind projects with the essential geographical information necessary for
understanding prime placement of renewable energy projects. As it currently stands, the
information required for these projects is dispersed over many different
sources and it is costly for start-ups to access the information necessary to
receive further funding. Not having a
plan in place for where the best conditions for solar or wind placement are and
having no communications or knowledge of the sites (in terms of zoning,
geography, or community support) increases the risk to investors. (Hoyer-Klick,
2010) This limits the ability to create
large-scale solar and wind projects, leaving such power generation to large
power companies equally invested in carbon-based energies, keeping the price of
solar and wind energy high, and cutting out small distributed producers to a larger
extent than would otherwise be the case. This will allow for more capital to be
invested in solar and wind energy, new smaller players to take part in the
industry, and more local business opportunities. This will bring solar and wind prices down allowing
for a more competitive renewable energy industry. This speaks to the second goal of the
Multilateral Working Group on Implementing the Major Economies Forum Global
Partnership’s Technology Action Plans for Wind Solar Technologies: Joint Capacity
Building. Capacity building in this sense is meant to
break down barriers, whether they be political, institutional, legal,
regulatory, economic, financial, informational, or technological in origin, and
then enhance growth. One of the major
ways this can happen through knowledge transfer. One way to achieve this is
twinning, or having a teacher from the industry in question guide individuals
who are new to the workforce through the learning and implementation process. (Wallasch,
2011)
The MEF also created a Clean Energy
Ministerial which has had annual meetings since 2010. The Ministerial is tasked with collectively
addressing the various initiatives created through the Technology Action
Plans. Working groups made up of various
MEF member states, additional states from outside the MEF, and private entities
collaborate on how to proceed with the planning and
implementation begun by the Technology Action Plans. The Clean Energy Ministerial has 14 clean
energy initiatives that it handles: energy efficiency in relation to 1.
appliances and 2. buildings and industry; clean energy supply in relation to 3.
bioenergy, 4. carbon capture, 5. hydropower, 6. solar and wind; 7. crosscutting
technologies and policy in relation to 8. 21st century power, 9.
clean energy policy, 10. energy access, 11. energy access, 12. smart grid, 13.
sustainable cities, and 14. women in clean energy. ("Our work | Clean Energy
Ministerial") Multiple reports
have come out from the group with varying levels of importance and
success. This is the key success of the
MEF.
UNFCCC or MEF
Both the UNFCCC and the MEF act as
international bodies for deliberation on the process of mitigating climate
change. The UNFCCC has a greater role in
determining what our reaction needs to be to the science of climate
change. This does not mean that it has
taken the science, from the IPCC or anywhere else, and used it
effectively. Both groups do not address
the need to bring atmospheric CO2 concentrations below 350 ppm within an
adequate timeframe. While the MEF seems
to be building a stronger energy sector bent on diversifying energy towards a
more carbon neutral portfolio, such discussions and actions could be made
within the UNFCCC framework. It seems
like a way to bypass the existing structure and claim that work is being done
while not making strong commitments to cut emissions. The MEF is made of many states who do not have emissions reduction commitments under the Kyoto Protocol. While this may be a good move for the US since it can
not join the Kyoto Protocol as a result of a Congress controlled by Republican
majorities, for others this is not as much of a problem. For this reason, and despite the excellent
initiative of creating a Global Solar and Wind Atlas, it seems like the MEF and
CEM are just a feint to get around the UNFCCC system and Kyoto Protocol.
Interviewing
Climate Change and Sustainability Academics
As part of
my internship I had to contact professors and programs working on climate
change and sustainability, soliciting their support and participation in our
film project Youth Climate Report. As a
result, I was able to speak with them about their work and gain some insight
into their views on policy. What I found
was most had no opinion on policy or sustainability efforts going on in the country. While this was not a scientific poll and
there was no distribution of the academics along any particular range, I
did get to speak with a variety of individuals from various fields. 2 stuck out to me as especially
knowledgeable, an older professor working on algae/plankton blooms in the
Atlantic from the Nicholas School at Duke and a younger woman working on
sustainable enterprise at Notre
Dame University. While the woman didn’t know anything of
policy or the Kyoto Protocol she did know a lot about sustainable engineering
and community resilience. The older
gentleman from Duke understood a lot about the UNFCCC process and spent almost
an hour pouring over the history he knew without my request. Out of 37 replies these two individuals took
the most time and had the most deliberate and informative answers for question
5. Other individuals only knew of
initiatives after much thought and could not recall specifics such as names. This all relates to question 4 and 5. Question 4 asked whether the individual
thought that local and regional initiatives were being more successful at
preventing climate change by cutting carbon emissions than local or regional
initiatives. Question 5 asked for local or regional initiatives that were being
successful in combating climate change.
Most answered yes for 4 but they could not give an answer for number 5
and if they did it was only a small local initiative that they vaguely knew
about (and they rarely knew the program's name).
This tells
me that the scientific community is generally disengaged from the political and
community aspects of climate change.
While science needs to remain objective climate change is an important
and unusual issue. With politicians
refusing to take action that will push atmospheric CO2 levels below 350 ppm it
would seem that leadership would have to come from the scientific
community. There are obviously
scientists who are willing to take up this responsibility such as James Hansen
and Michael Mann. They are few though
and much like the actual changing of our economy the creation of a movement to
prevent climate change will come from a sea change in the communication of the
science. In short, it is a community
effort. The need for this is even more
important considering the lack of such an important issue being addressed at
length in the presidential debates.
Conclusion
I began
this paper thinking that the global initiatives such as the UNFCCC and the
Kyoto Protocol were failures and that regional and local initiatives would show
the effectiveness of smaller localized efforts, much like the academics I interviewed. I was wrong.
The relative outcomes between the programs were comparable with each other. However, the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol
were not voluntary or industry specific.
Their regulations and conditions ranged over every GHG emitting source and
sink in an entire country across the whole world. This is a monumental task for any institution
and for the work to be comparable to much smaller voluntary measures such as
the RGGI and CCX is a testament to its effectiveness.
The fact that many academics did
not address this fact either was shocking to me. Many believed local and regional initiatives
to have a much greater impact than the UN led initiatives. This may still be true if all emissions cuts
from all local initiatives and efforts are taken into account. That is a task beyond the capabilities of author right now though. When the regional carbon markets are measured
against the Kyoto Protocol however the efficiency seems the same (I am not
taking credits from HFC production into account, which could easily change my
conclusion here, considering HFC mitigation accounted for the largest portion of
credits on the EU ECS). When asked why the UNFCCC and Kyoto Protocol are failures the answer was generally due to the fact that the US did not
participate in the Kyoto Protocol and not because of some inefficiency in
it. For this reason it would seem that
the global regime is actually far more effective for its scale than the local
initiatives.
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