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New Draft Agreements Released

By Osman Faruqi

12 December, 2009
NewMatilda.com Blog

Yesterday the two Chair’s of each negotiation “track” released new draft negotiation texts.

The COP15 discussions are divided into a number of smaller working groups, meeting to decide on issues ranging from finance to technology. The two biggest, called the two tracks of the negotiation, are the Ad-hoc Working Group on the Kyoto Protocol (AWG-KP) and the Ad-hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action (AWG-LCA). The AWG-KP is focussed on defining the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol and as such retains the spirit of the initial text, including the separation of countries into Annex 1 (those developed countries that must make emissions reductions) and non-Annex 1 (developing countries who don’t have a requirement to reduce their emissions). The AWG-LCA was set up to try and create a new treaty separate to the Kyoto Protocol, which many developed countries argue has failed, that can have a broader scope than Kyoto and include emission reduction targets for developing countries.

One of the most difficult aspects of the conference will be trying to merge these two tracks, especially since the G77 want to keep the Kyoto Protocol framework and the developed countries want to start over.

Based on their observations of the negotiations the Chair’s of each of the negotiation tracks released draft texts which include the framework for a treaty but leave key decisions such as emissions reduction targets and the commitment period as a choice for countries to make as the negotiations develop.

For example:

Parties shall cooperate to avoid dangerous climate change, in keeping with the ultimate objective of the Convention, recognizing [the broad scientific view] that the increase in global average temperature above pre-industrial levels ought not to exceed [2°C][1.5°C];

Discussions began late last night on whether to adopt the draft texts.

It’s likely that if there’s a deal at Copenhagen it will contain at least some of what’s currently included in each of the texts so what follows is an analysis of some of the key issues in each of the drafts.

The main thing to note about the LCA text is that it’s pretty light on detail. It offers a range of options on emissions reductions and setting a ceiling on global temperature rise, but doesn’t include the other key elements required to achieve those targets such as finance and technology plans.

The emissions reduction options in the text range from 50-95 per cent, compared to 1990 levels, globally, distinguishing between cuts of 75 to least 95 per cent for developed countries and 15 to 30 per cent for developing countries as compared to business as usual.

The reference to capping temperature rises at either 2°C or 1.5°C is ambitious, particularly since restricting temperature rise to 1.5°C will require developing technology to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

One surprising element of the text is the reference to developing countries achieving their targets primarily through domestic efforts. As expected, Australia isn’t happy as they were hoping to achieve their emissions reductions through the purchase of international offsets.

The Kyoto Protocol text is more interesting because it is clear that the negotiations are moving along, although there are still a number of sticking points and wildly divergent options provided.

It calls on developed countries to to reduce their emissions by 30-45 per cent by either 2018 or 2020. However the more interesting aspects of the texts aren’t the targets but the mechanisms surrounding them, such as the decisions relating to Land use, land-use change and forestry (LULUCF) and the clean development mechanism.

LULUCF covers emissions and offsets from the forestry and land management sector. It is always closely watched because of the potential for loopholes that can allow countries to claim emission reductions that don’t actually exist.

The loopholes certainly exist in the draft text.

One of the biggest issues is that a potential change to the definition of forests which would have separated native forests from plantation has been dropped, which means that native forests can be cleared and replaced with plantation without incurring any penalty under the system.

This is a problem because it’s know that native forests are better carbon sinks than planations. In fact, yesterday the Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group of the Convention on Biological Diversity released a paper pointing out that exact fact.

The other major problem is what’s referred to as “forward looking baselines” which are still in play. Essentially these allow countries to create an artificial baseline based on future projections of forest management, or logging. So if the logging undertaken was lower than this predicted future projection, it would be accounted for as an emission reduction. Hundreds of papers and submissions have been written about the problems with this structure, but it’s pretty clear that’s disconnected from the reality of emissions reductions.

The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) is another crucial part of the Kyoto Protocol that allows industrialised countries to offset their emissions by investing in projects that reduce emissions in developing countries.

Australia has been pushing hard to get carbon capture and storage included as part of the CDM and it seems to be paying off. The options for carbon capture and storage include not making it eligible for the CDM, making it eligible or passing the responsibility onto the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice, a scientific advisory body under the UNFCCC. No one seems to want to take responsibility for this decision, as the CDM executive board initially handed over responsibility to COP, so the third option is probably the most likely. The same options apply for nuclear power.

It’s extremely difficult to predict which way the negotiations will go in terms of both the LCA and KP texts. Most of the moderate positions have been excluded and we’re now left with extremes on both sides. Progress appears to have been made in some areas, at least informally, but there’s no resolution on how to merge the two tracks of negotiations - leaving open the possibility of the US and possibly other developed countries not signing on.

Copyright 2009 © newmatilda.com



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