But countries did move beyond their positions in significant ways.
China agreed to international listing and review of pledge. US agreed
to $100 billion annual funding and short term finance, plus personal
commitment by Obama to minus 17%. Agreement was far from easy - people
sweated blood to get it!
Best
Dan
On Dec 21, 2009, at 10:32 AM, Heike Schroeder <[email protected]
> wrote:
Hi All,
Thought I'd put my 2 cents in as well...
On Wil's 1st point: I agree that anything but a political framework
was off the table well before 43,000 registered COP15 attendees (and
some 100,000 protesters) gathered in Copenhagen. But given that 120
or so heads of state were coming to town (including Obama himself)
gave people like Ivo de Boer hope to publicly state (as he did at
Forest Day) that heads of state don't come for failure. It nurtured
a sense of optimism among attendees that Obama, Wen (the Chinese
premier) and also EU reps would not come empty-handed but move
beyond their positions in at least some way, either by more concrete
pledging of finance or stronger unilateral targets. None of this
happened, except the 2 degrees inclusion in the final version of the
Accord. To me, this is where the disappointment lies.
Best, Heike
--
Dr. Heike Schroeder
Tyndall Senior Research Fellow
Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research
James Martin 21st Century School Research Fellow
Environmental Change Institute
University of Oxford
South Parks Road
Oxford OX1 3QY
Tel: 01865 275894
Fax: 01865 275850
________________________________________
From: [email protected] [owner-gep-
[email protected]] On Behalf Of Daniel Bodansky
[[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, December 21, 2009 5:19 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Fwd: Re: Copenhagen result
Hi all,
I sent the message below last night from an email account not
registered with GEPED, so it bounced. It doesn't take account of
the subsequent discussion from others. For those who are
interested, I've been blogging about the Copenhagen meeting on the
international law blog, opiniojuris.org. I plan to post some
preliminary thoughts on the Copenhagen Accord on Monday.
Dan
Earlier email message:
Hi Radoslav, Wil and Mat,
Just wanted to chime in with a few points:
First, just a clarifications regarding Radoslav's email:
-- Although the Copenhagen Accord wasn't adopted as a COP decision,
it was agreed by 20+ countries. Saudi Arabia didn't oppose the
Accord, only its adoption as a COP decision. (Sudan was also among
the countries that agreed to the Accord, although don't count on it
to associate itself with the Accord formally.) The Accord was
reportedly endorsed by all of the regional groups, and in the COP
plenary the spokepeople for both AOSIS and the African group
supported its adoption as a COP decision.
-- Second, the US did support a mandate for the AWG-LCA to negotiate
a legally-binding agreement for adoption in Mexico City (along with
the EU, AOSIS and others). The proposal was killed by China and
India.
-- Third, the position articulated by South Africa about adoption of
a KP second commitment period amendment reflects the view of the
G-77 generally.
With respect to Wil's comments, and Matt's responses:
1. I agree with Wil on this point. Pretty much everybody had given
up on a legal agreement in Copenhagen by the end of the Barcelona
meeting in November, and many had seen the writing on the wall much
earlier. I have to strongly disagree with Mat's view that the
Copenhagen Accord was easy. Given the total opposition by China
(and to a lesser degree India) to any form of listing of their
intensity target or any form of international review, getting
agreement on the Copenhagen Accord was a huge stretch -- so if one
regards the Accord as a pretty modest outcome, just imagine what
getting a legal agreement will be like!!
2. Generally agree with Wil on this too, although I agree with Mat
that the legal nature of the KP has been significant.
3. Nothing to add here.
4. The Copenhagen Accord may well be the high water mark for
climate agreements anytime soon, so let's hope it proves to be
significant!!
Finally a few additional comments:
-- The Copenhagen meeting proves the utter dysfunctionality of the
UNFCCC process. The final night, a handful of essentially rogue
states, led by Sudan, blocked a COP decision adopting a political
agreement by the Heads of State/Government of all of the major world
powers.
-- The Copenhagen meeting also revealed the complete breakdown of
the G-77 as a negotiating group. In the closing plenary, some
developing countries openly criticized their G-77 "brethren" (read
China) for preventing inclusion of more ambitious emission reduction
numbers in the Copenhagen Accord.
Best Dan
