Dear All With reference to Radoslav's update from the climate talks, I worked last week at the Meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol in Egypt. Of relevance to climate, two amendments were offered to add HFCs to the control measures of the Montreal Protocol (1 by Micronesia and Mauritius and 1 by the USA, Mexico and Canada). HFCs are not ozone depleting but do have relatively high GWPs. Those supporting placing controls on HFCs under the ozone regime argue that (a) HFCs exist largely because the regime has largely eliminated CFCs and (b) the ozone regime has an extremely success set of rules and procedures and thus should contribute to climate protection where it can, as it did in 2007 by rapidly accelerating the HCFC phase-out. Neither was approved and there are of course other reasons behind aspects of the initiatives, which are both positive and negative for the near-term prospects of comprehensive climate policy, but this is another sign that with certain countries, especially SIDS, are eager to go after GHG emissions and sinks in whatever forum they can.
The ENB was at the meeting and their summary report will provide details on the HFCs aspects of the talks and the EU intention to advance a decision at Copenhagen to have the UNFCCC Parties request the Montreal Protocol parties to consider addressing HFCs within the proven and robust framework of the ozone regime. The news that Zammit-Gutajar proposed officially dropping the idea of a formal climate treaty for Copenhagen is not much of a surprise to most delegates here. As far back as Bali, many participants in the side-events, myself included, stated publicly that regardless of the strength of the Bali roadmap that would emerge from the meetings, there was almost no chance of an agreement on a comprehensive treaty in 2 years that had binding short and long-term targets and timetables, or other types of severe mandated actions, for all countries. Many delegates, including some from key counties or regions, said the same privately. The Climate Secretariat has also been trying to lower expectations for at least a year. That said, if countries can emerge from Copenhagen with an strong umbrella framework that had clear buy in from Brazil, China, EU, India, Indonesia, and the USA then it might indeed be a success. That said, the prospects of peaking CO2e global emissions in 2015 and probably even 2020 look extremely dim, and have for more than 3 years. -------------------------------------------------------- David Downie Director, Program on the Environment Associate Professor of Politics Fairfield University Fairfield University, Donnarumma 217 1073 North Benson Road Fairfield, CT 06824 [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ; 203-254-4000, ext 3504 ________________________________ From: [email protected] on behalf of Radoslav Dimitrov Sent: Wed 11/4/2009 9:09 AM To: [email protected]; Global Environmental Politics Education ListServe; [email protected] Cc: [email protected]; Jon Gamu; Radoslav Dimitrov Subject: Update: climate talks in Barcelona PLEASE DO NOT 'REPLY TO ALL' Dear colleagues, Regards from the climate talks in Barcelona. I am a government delegate in the EU block and write to inform you of an important development here. Yesterday afternoon the Chair of the Convention negotiations Michael Zammit-Gutajar proposed to everyone to drop the idea of a climate treaty for Copenhagen, and to instead aim for a "core decision on political commitment to action." This would be a nonbinding decision with elements on mitigation, adaptation, finance and tech transfer. The motivation is to buy more time for continued negotiations after Copenhagen. This morning, the head of the UNFCCC Secretariat lobbied coalitions and suggested 6-12 months of talks after Copenhagen. Reactions from delegations are still coming. For now, the EU will continue to insist on a legally binding agreement. But there are many signs of a weak Copenhagen outcome (NGOs call it "greenwashing"). The African offensive At the same time, the African Group blocked negotiations on the Kyoto Protocol track. They said, "No further discussions until 'numbers' are finalized (on emissions reductions in Annex I countries)." This move suspended KP negotiations for a full day. The blackmail succeeded: to exit the stalemate, yesterday informal agreement was reached to dedicate 60 percent of KP talks to numbers. So the Africans won - and they gave everyone 24 hours grace period before they shut down the talks again if they do not see progress. Best regards from Spain, Radoslav S. Dimitrov, Ph.D. Associate Professor Department of Political Science University of Western Ontario Social Science Centre London, Ontario Canada N6A 5C2 Tel. +1(519) 661-2111 ext. 85023 Fax +1(519) 661-3904 Email: [email protected]
