In the news this week (Special Edition:Ongoing UN Climate Talks)...



(Source: The Economist, 3rd December 2011)



As this topic has been well covered in the media this week, I thought I would dedicate an entire post to the on-going debates at the UN’s annual climate change conference in Durban. As I type, delegates continue to deliberate our global stance on tackling climate change. The current focus is setting out the details of the Green Climate Fund and the more contested issue of whether a second Kyoto Protocol should be adopted. The latter, as the Guardian illustrated is a highly divided issue, with most developed countries wanting to scrape the initiative whilst developing countries are still mainly behind a new protocol being created (Figure 1) (Coulter, 2011)

Figure 1: Diverging views of public opinion on the threat of climate change between developed and developing nations(Source: The Guardian, 1st December 2011)

The growing gap between the opinion of the public in developed and developing regions was also supported by a survey by the National Geographic of seventeen countries including Britain, Sweden, China and India. This gap has increased since 2007 and may be partly related to the increased awareness of how climate change can impact the environment in developing nations which are currently more significantly affected by extreme weather events.

The current Kyoto Protocol to be blunt has failed to reduce current carbon dioxide emissions which have increased by over a quarter since it came into force in 1997, mainly due to emissions by developing nations (see Figure 2). And this is the issue. The current protocol does not restrict the emissions of developing nations which equate to 58% of the global emissions each year (The Economist, 2011). Thus, the EU suggest that under the new agreement, all countries should commit to reducing their carbon emissions, although the burden on developing countries would be lower than for developed nations.  Some developing nations such as China and India have already agreed improve the carbon efficiency of their industries. However, currently these nations will not turn this into a legally binding agreement as their priority is still economic development rather than reducing global warming.

Figure 2: The contribution of countries to the total carbon dioxide emissions for 2007 (Source: The Economist, 3rd December 2011)

The current outlook from the conference is largely unclear. A new protocol is still possible but it will depend largely on how countries weight the global aim of reducing carbon emissions against their own prioritises of continuing economic growth. With emissions in China per person, now greater than some European countries, their decision in particular will determine whether our target to restrict global warming to 2°C can be achieved (Jacobs, 2011), .

Reference:

The Economist (2011) ‘Climate change talks: wilted greenery’, 3^rd October 2011

Coulter, C. (2011) ‘ Climate change concern highest in the developing world’, The Guardian, 1^st December 2011.

Jacobs, M. (2011) ‘UN talks see delayer countries throw away the 2°C goal’, The Guardian, 1^st December, 2011.