Sergio Abranches

Last week, China’s National Development and Reform Commission reportedly directed seven regions to set overall emissions control targets and submit proposals for how caps should be allocated. The directive, which encompasses the cities of Beijing, Chongqing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Tianjin and the provinces of Guangdong and Hubei, aims to establish cap-and-trade pilot projects for the country’s carbon market, meant to be in place by 2015.

The Chinese government had signaled at the COP17 climate negotiations in South Africa last December that it could adopt a more ambitious emissions reduction policy by 2015 and 2020. As part of the Copenhagen Accord, it had already committed to reducing carbon emissions intensity by 40-45 percent between 2005 and 2020.

That (albeit non-binding) commitment is reflected in the nation’s 2011-2015 five-year plan, which sets a 16-17 percent reduction target for carbon intensity.

China has never committed globally to actions that were not already a part of its ongoing domestic policies. The carbon intensity targets pledged under the Copenhagen Accord were decided internally way before Prime Minister Wen Jiabao closed a deal with the United States and other countries in Copenhagen in 2009. Now, China is poised to implement a new stage of its emissions reduction policies with fixed emissions caps.

Chinese leaders are apparently more willing to sign multilateral agreements, provided they are not a constraint on domestic policies. The way to do that is to use the Chinese planning structure to their advantage. By formulating the future stages of their policies ahead of the international agenda of negotiations, especially in the environmental realm, Chinese leaders can shift from a veto position towards a cooperative one, while maintaining complete sovereignty over domestic decision-making.

China has plenty of reasons of its own to reduce pollution, resource use and greenhouse gas emissions. It needs no outside push. The impact of land, air and water pollution on public health and well-being justifies the adoption of a more ambitious environment and climate policy. The major problem is, and will continue to be, how to balance the goals of cutting pollution and boosting efficiency with economic growth.

Carbon intensity targets pose no constraints at all on growth. Emissions can still increase while intensity decreases. China is implementing the world’s most ambitious renewable energy program, with very aggressive targets. Although solar and wind power generation are growing at staggering rates, the use of fossil fuels, particularly coal, have also increased.

This means that while China’s green energy sector is becoming very significant, its grey energy sector remains an enormous one and keeps growing, though at falling rates. The difference is that in the new Chinese policy guidelines, the gray energy sector comes with a negative sign for growth, and the green energy sector comes with a positive one. Each new plan aims at further reducing the gray sector, and increasing the green one.

The caveat is, again, the scale here. Even with downward movement at each new five-year plan, the Chinese gray economy will remain huge for decades to come. Carbon emissions associated with fossil fuel use will be on the rise well into the 2020s if not the 2030s.

Emissions caps are no guarantee that emissions will decrease faster. The experience with cap and trade systems shows they require additional measures for emissions to fall significantly. The good news is that China is also investing more in efficiency and quality improvement. Increasing the efficiency of clean energy along with energy-saving technologies can shift the economy toward more efficient patterns of energy and resource use, accelerating emissions reductions.

The best of all news is that China is abandoning the policy of growth without environmental constraints that led to the vast pollution and resource scarcity problems the country now faces. Chinese plans still aim at rates of growth far above the world average, but at the same time  they are adopting progressively greater constraints on the use of resources and fossil fuels.

(Post previously posted at National Geographic’s The Great Energy Challenge Blog)

Sergio Abranches

Why the Durban Platform is a political breakthrough, but a dismal outcome in the light of climate science?

The second part of the question is far easier to answer. Negotiators in Durban have agreed to review the pledges for emissions reductions in the second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol and Cancun Agreement by 2015 in the light of the fifth assessment report on the state of science, to be released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change from September 2013. However, as the IPCC said on a press statement about COP17, “in its fourth assessment report published in 2007, the IPCC showed that a temperature increase of 2 degrees Celsius could have a damaging effect on water supplies, biodiversity, food supplies, coastal flooding and storms and health.”

Additionally, the IPCC also states that:

“The fourth assessment report shows that emissions of the greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming must fall by 2050 by 50-85% globally compared to the emissions of the year 2000, and that global emissions must peak well before the year 2020, with a substantial decline after that, in order to limit the growth in global average temperatures to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.”

From the standpoint of science Durban has decided on too little too late.

In the political realm, though, COP17 was a watershed. First of all, it closes a whole chapter of negotiations on commitment periods under the Kyoto Protocol. There will be only a second one, with fewer ratifiers than the first. COP18 will still have to decide whether it will end by 2017 or 2020. There has been no consensus on the end date, and the alternatives ended up within brackets. But the main point has been resolved: it will be replaced by a new “protocol, another legal instrument or an agreed outcome with legal force under the Convention applicable to all Parties”, no later than 2020. That’s the core decision contained in the Durban Platform.

The above expression is a political breakthrough, one that has been progressively taking shape since COP15, in Copenhagen. There, for the first time ever, the United States and the BASIC countries (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) have agreed to offer quantified pledges for emission reductions under the United Nations Climate Convention (UNFCCC). They were voluntary, not legally binding, but they have been formally registered with UNFCCC”s Executive Secretariat. It was a major first step and, at the same time, a frustrating decision.

Much more was expected from the leaders of both developed, and emerging world powers. Besides, the leaders left abruptly, creating an authority gap, between the political summit and the official Conference of the Parties. A weak COP presidency and the resulting authority gap led the plenary to only “take note” of what the leaders had agreed. The Copenhagen Accord was noted as a political decision, but did not become an “official” agreement under the track of the Convention.

The second step towards the breakthrough was made in Cancun. The pledges under the Copenhagen Accord were adopted by the Cancun Agreement, that has also made official several other decisions made in Copenhagen, as well as some that were left to be finalized by COP16, in Mexico. In Cancun, the voluntary commitments became official ones, under the umbrella of the Climate Convention.

In Durban, negotiators from the United States, the BASIC group, and the European Union underlined the official nature of the Cancun Agreement, as a preparation of the groundwork for the Platform to launch the process leading to the new universal agreement with legal force applicable to all parties to the Climate Convention. In a nutshell, it was acknowledged by all relevant parties that these commitments are legal, although not binding. The difference: the Kyoto Protocol, besides being a legal instrument, explicitly states that the targets for the countries (“industrialized countries”) listed on its Annex I are mandatory. The Cancun Agreement is part and parcel of the Climate Convention, therefore it has legal status, but the commitments registered by the parties are voluntary, not mandatory.

Finally, the Durban Platform takes the decisive step: it commits all major emitters outside the Kyoto Protocol to the negotiation of a new agreement with legal force, under which all commitments will have the same legal treatment, although they could be quantitatively differentiated on the basis of each party’s capacities.

This is not an easy decision to make. Even before it is formally adopted it is likely to cause the countries to start planning domestic actions to enable them to meet the targets yet to be defined. It is unrealistic to imagine, as some environmentalists do, that a “top down approach”, by which a decision under the Climate Convention would bind countries to take actions, would ever work.

Even the Kyoto Protocol praised for its “legally binding” status has no enforcement mechanism. What enforcement mechanism could lead Canada to meet its targets for the first period of commitment next year? None at all. Even with UN officials stating that although outside the Protocol it still has the obligation, Canada will likely fail to meet its Kyoto target, and there will hardly be any consequence to its noncompliance.

Politics hardly moves ahead of the facts. It is not a proactive process. It is a responsive one. Politics responds to active interests in economy and society. It seldom reflects even the “inactive majority” or the majority of “public opinion”. Political decisions respond to “active interest groups”, to economic constraints and inducements, and to the domestic correlation of power. Countries that show greater ambition of emissions reductions also have greater active political support from domestic economic and social forces to policies aiming at coping with climate change. Their domestic policies are usually more ambitious than their multilateral commitments.

If one looks at China’s domestic policies to reduce emissions and other forms of pollution, one will easily see that they are far ahead of what Chinese lead negotiators are willing to commit to at the Climate Convention.

Politics, in this sense, consolidates what countries are ripe to commit to at the multilateral level. The approach that really counts, and leads to progress in the negotiations under the Climate Convention is the bottom up one.

What is meaningful and relevant about the Durban process is that over the last three years major developed and emerging countries have become readier to admit to the possibility of a single climate change regime encompassing them all. The US, China, India, and Brazil said that much several times during COP17, and signed into it at the end. This outcome was not guaranteed at the outset of the climate talks. It was the result of intense negotiation and consultation. Negotiators have likely had to obtain a specific mandate from their leaders, in mid-game, to go as far as they’ve gone.

What will happen next will depend on what happens inside each of these countries. The focus of pressure should be domestic politics, rather than diplomatic undertakings. Not that the COP process doesn’t matter. It does, very much. But its main function is not to shape climate change policies to be adopted domestically. It is to consolidate progress on domestic climate change policies at the multilateral level, adding cross-country constraints and global transparency to the agreed actions. This enables, for instance, a network of domestic and global civil society organizations to join forces to act as watchdogs, to ensure that policies are in line with targets. It does make a difference to have a global accounting system for greenhouse gas emissions, and to have a global registry for quantitative targets for emission reductions. These outcomes would strengthen the multilateral regulatory system, and would also give more punch to domestic pressure from civil society and opposition parties in overseeing their government’s implementation of climate change policies.

The year 2015 has become a new milestone for global climate change politics. Two crucial decisions shall be taken at COP21, if the Durban Platform is to be completed. Firstly, the review of the emission reduction commitments to seek coherence with the 2 degrees Celsius target. As pointed before, it is absolutely sure that the new IPCC report will show a serious gap between committed actions and warming trends. If parties are to take their commitments seriously, they’ll have to revise their targets upwards for the period 2015-2020. Secondly, they’ll have to decide on the new “protocol, another legal instrument or an agreed outcome with legal force under the Convention applicable to all Parties” to be adopted no later than 2020.

The political engine is set to move. The pace and destination it will take will depend on the evolution of domestic economic and social forces over the next three years. Another important factor will be the domestic interplay of interests, and the power of pressure and advocacy groups. Bilateral and multilateral politics do have a role, but never a dominant one. Competition and coalition among nations and groups of nations, also help in shaping decisions. They’ll help to pave the way to future outcomes. But they do so by responding to domestic interests and projecting them on the global arena.

Sergio Abranches, from Durban

The documents still circulating at COP17 show notable political progress, but fall short of adequately meeting the risks already pointed out by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change — IPCC — fourth assessment of climate science. They are still under discussion, and final decision may still be significantly different. It is likely, however, they will keep the general thrust of the documents.

Politics is rarely moved by the science on the issues requiring policy decisions. Politics is moved by interests, interactions, power competition, alliances, and conflicts. All that play a strong role to shape the global politics of climate change. At the political level there are unprecedented moves reflected on documents not yet approved by COP17 plenary.

Perhaps the most important one is the support from the United States, China, India and Brazil of a a “process to develop a Protocol or another legal instrument applicable to all Parties under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change”. This process, says the draft document, shall “begin immediately and be conducted as a matter of urgency”, so that the new working group the plenary should create can “complete its work as early as possible but no later than 2015, in order to adopt this legal instrument” at COP21. It “shall raise levels of ambition and be informed, inter alia, by the fifth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the outcomes of the 2013-2015 review”.

In short this means that by 2020 there should be a common legal regime on climate change encompassing all parties to the climate convention, that this legal instrument could even be a new protocol, thus legally-binding, it would have quantified mitigation targets for all major emitters. The new instrument should be ready to be adopted by 2015, at COP21. The quantitative targets should in line with the new IPCC assessment report, that should be used to guide the review of the commitments made in Copenhagen and reaffirmed on the Cancun Agreement.

The other breakthrough is the formal admission that there is a “significant gap between the aggregated effect of Parties’ mitigation pledges in terms of global annual emissions of greenhouse gases by 2020 and aggregate emissions pathways consistent with having a likely chance of holding warming below 2°C or 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.”

In other words the document formally notes, and with grave concern, that there is a gap between the commitments to reduce GHG emissions and the commitment to keep the chances of warming below 2°C or 1.5°C. The 2°C is the target approved under the Copenhagen Accord, and the Cancun Agreement. The 1.5°C is a demand from the small islands states, the African Group, and the Less Developed Countries, admitted by the Cancun Agreement.

These hard to make political steps forward are a sine qua non for a more ambitious, science-based, rule-based future global climate change policy.

Sergio Abranches

As the first segment of COP17 comes to an inconclusive closing, negotiators are adding the bits and pieces coming out of their talks to figure out where they stand. They are working to narrow down the options to be presented to the ministers for further deliberation during the political segment, starting on Monday.

Although there has been fair progress on several technical matters, consensus is still lacking on the fundamentals. Nobody expects grand decisions to be made here in Durban, but a reiteration of a complete deadlock might severely damage UNFCCC’s credibility. All parties know they’ll need to arrive at a package deal with meaningful and practical results on finance and technology, as well as clear guidance as to future steps towards building a global climate change regime.

A second period of commitment under the Kyoto Protocol seems hard to obtain. Negotiators are considering some legal solutions to avoid a gap among commitment periods. There has been considerable agreement among parties that this gap should be avoided. Although a fully ratifiable amendment seems unlikely, negotiators could still decide on a transition mechanism to keep the Protocol alive.

Japan has insisted yesterday that the way forward is to start working immediately on a new comprehensive legally-binding agreement. Japan chief envoy Masahiko Horie proposed that COP17 establishes a new working group to draft this agreement that should be completed as soon as possible. The baseline for the agreement would be the Cancun Agreement.

A delegate from one of the BASIC countries said that it is imperative to look for a suitable solution to get the United States aboard, and convince the EU and other parties to agree to a second period of commitment. He hinted that there has been some work towards devising a legal form as strong as possible but short of requiring ratification. The negotiator said many feel uneasy with the possibility of deciding on a new treaty, even with support from the US, only to see the Senate in Washington refusing to ratify the treaty later on.

A non-ratifiable agreement would seem a more practical and working solution than the demand for a fully legally-binding agreement.

According to Reuters, China’s lead negotiator Su Wei said yesterday that “since the EU is the only group of parties that is ready to consider a second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol we are ready and willing to engage constructively with the EU.” Su Wei is also reported to have said that China does not “rule out the possibility of [a] legally binding [agreement]. It is possible for us, but it depends on the negotiations.”

Finding a middle ground on major issues seems unlikely on the light of what has happened during the first week. Usually deferring decisions to the ministers at the political segment is no solution. Countries will hardly change their views on relevant issues on the spot. If there is any card to play on the second week, it has already been decided ahead of the meeting, at home. Ministers may or may not play these cards depending on the moves from other key players. But they will hardly change game at this stage of the process.

Sergio Abranches, from Durban

After a Thursday of rumors and very few press briefings, the technical segment of COP17 closes today with no clear outlines of a deal. A delegate said negotiators feel like walking a minefield with parties holding to incompatible bottom-line positions. Several key negotiators said yesterday that a relatively good package deal is likely to be approved, but they can’t foresee what it may contain.

A negotiator from the BASIC group (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) said the technical segment is moving forward faster than in other COPs, but final decisions will come the hard way. There are no easy ways here, he added. Another negotiator acknowledged a deal is likely, but so far it is impossible to know what it will contain.

The European Union has reiterated its support for a multilateral, rules-based, legally-binding treaty encompassing all countries. Australia and Japan supported this new legally-binding instrument, with specific obligations for a larger set of parties than the Kyoto Protocol.

On the side the EU and other key parties have been trying to convince both the United States and China to sign on to a roadmap leading to this new treaty by 2015. The US negotiator said on the same stocktaking informal meeting that his country supports a legally-binding agreement including commitments from all major economies. He may be referring to the countries that participate in the Major Economies Forum (MEF).

On a radio interview, US chief climate negotiator Todd Stern, has said that his country “is not prepared to go forward on the basis of the old-style agreement, which essentially had a firewall between all developed countries and all developing countries.” All these words could be summarized as “we want China into the agreement”.

This does not seem an impossible demand any longer. An expert with a Chinese government think tank, Xu Huaqing, has told China Daily that China is likely to agree to a quantified target to limit its greenhouse gas emissions after 2020. Negotiators here in Durban have been hinting that China will go one step forward towards accepting to be a party into a future legally-binding agreement. It would depend on a similar move from the United States.

These same negotiators think that the US could also make a step forward. If both do move, the European Union proposed roadmap may well be the way all parties commit in principle to a future deal. Negotiators from the BASIC countries have held an informal talk with Europe “to better understand their idea of a roadmap”. On a meeting of G77+China several parties have raised concerns that this proposal for a new treaty would mean changing the Climate Convention to remove the clause on differentiated obligations. G77 countries consider this clause irremovable and non-negotiable.

It seems the EU negotiators have convinced the BASIC delegates that this is not the case. The new treaty would bind all, but with differentiated obligations. The BASIC envoys seemed satisfied, but they will have a hard time convincing the more recalcitrant and/or unconfident G77 parties. Reaching a consensus on the most relevant issues within the amorphous and heterogeneous G77 has become almost impossible.

Lack of consensus within the G77 may not however be an insurmountable obstacle to a deal. As the group breaks into more coherent coalitions, such as the BASIC, the AOSIS (small island states), the Less Developed Countries (LDCs), fractionalization may lead to a better understanding. After all, what is really being negotiated is a future agreement binding the  developed and the BASIC countries. If China moves, Brazil, India, and South Africa are very likely to move in the same direction. The BASIC countries seem almost ready to do such a move, provided they are assured their binding obligations will be differentiated quantitatively and/or in terms of their timing.

Several G77 countries have been demanding an agreement binding all major emitters, including the larger developing countries. Although G77+China is a negotiating group, vote can be split, and a non-veto instance could be negotiated among them. Such a deal would very likely depend on other issues being drafted as asked by these other G77 countries. They are far more concerned, for instance, with the non-discriminatory distribution of the Green Climate Fund resources, adaptation, and technological cooperation.

Whether decision on all open issues will converge to a satisfactory package deal by the end of COP17 remains to be seen. There still are contradictory signs. But it is fair to say that negotiators are trying hard to clear a path leading to such a deal. It is not an easy one, but it falls within the range of possibilities.

Sergio Abranches, from Durban

The first day fully dedicated to informal consultations and negotiations in Durban, South Africa, where COP17 is convened, has produced faint signs that some progress may be possible over the next days. Some negotiators said today that there has been some movement forward regarding what they call technical issues.

Some were hopeful that tangible progress could happen in the days ahead to close a package deal comprising the Green Climate Fund, and the Technology Center and Network, both deemed necessary to support developing countries do adapt to climate change and to adopt clean technology and renewable energy as they develop their economy. On what is considered to be the political agenda, regarding a second period of commitment under the Kyoto Protocol, and a new global climate change agreement under the Climate Convention, there has been no progress at all. Very subtle signaling from some key parties have, however, raised hope that some progress may be obtained over the weekend.

The chief negotiator for the European Union, Arthur Runge Metzger, has acknowledged the expectation that a package deal of financial and technological resources could be approved soon. He said that the European Union would rather have a different solution on some points of the document on the governing structure of the Green Climate Fund, but would approve the formula presented by the Transitional Committee created in Cancun to design the fund. The EU would like, in turn, that the Green Climate Fund could start operating as early in 2012 as possible.

Other negotiators argue the Europeans are eager to have the technical package deal wrapped up to have something tangible to offer its African partners. And what the African countries need the most is financial and technological help for adaptation to climate change.

Ambassador André Corrêa do Lago, Brazil’s chief climate negotiator sees a financial and technological package deal as more likely now. He explained that negotiators are trying to accommodate corrections some parties say are a necessary condition to approve the package, but without having to reopen the document.

Reopening a document on a COP is no simple matter. Negotiations follow a rule saying that “nothing is closed until everything has been closed”. If a clause is reopened all other are automatically set to be rediscussed as well. This could represent losing months of work in a single hour. Diplomats are now trying to figure out a way to make corrections on some points of the document without declaring it reopened. Making corrections on a closed document is no easy feat, but, if there is good will and no party objects, diplomats have a few tricks that would make it to happen

On the political track of the convention, discussing a new period of commitment under the Kyoto Protocol, and a new global agreement under the Climate Convention, progress has been far less visible. But negotiators give notice that there have been a few subtle moves that might indicate the possibility of some progress in the days to come. A phrase showing a very discreet change of attitude on a statement, a subtle use of words during a conversation are read as signs that a party may be more open to remove a veto and become more cooperative under certain conditions. Like a discreet nod of the head or a slight wave of hands to incrementally raise the bid on a very disputed auction, these signs are used by negotiators to keep talking in the direction so indicated as more conducive to an agreement.

These very subtle cues seem to indicate that the European Union, Australia and New Zealand could support a second period of commitment under the Kyoto Protocol. This outcome for the Kyoto Protocol would require that the United States agree to a future binding agreement, and that China, once seeing such a move from the US would also point to the possibility of being a party to this future agreement. If China does move in this direction, Brasil, India and South Africa would follow suit. If the US and the BASIC countries agree to a future agreement, then all other developed countries unwilling to be a party to a second period of commitment under the Kyoto Protocol would also agree to be a party to the new agreement. Hopefully, says a negotiator who supports a second period under Kyoto, even would ultimately sign in to a second period.

The tricky question would be the timeline for all these new moves. Some negotiators think that the only feasible date for a future agreement would be 2020. Others consider 2020 too late, and ask that the new global agreement be signed in 2015. This has a relationship with the scope of the second period of commitment under the Kyoto Protocol. If the magic date becomes 2015, those countries advocating a five-year second period of commitment would probably prevail. If the deadline becomes 2020, it is likely that the second period of commitment would be eighth years long as the first.

No one is envisaging a game changer in Durban. What they see is just a bridge to cross these troubled economic times. After the crisis has passed, negotiators would likely be more willing to commit to more ambitious emission reduction targets. A global climate change regime that could bridge the “ambitions gap”, that is the gap between what science considers necessary to face the dangers of climate change, and what the countries are willing to do is still too far away on the horizon.  The goal in Durban is to approve a practical package deal, and try to prevent fatal damage to the credibility of the UNFCCC.

Sérgio Abranches

A document from the State Council released today spells out Beijing’s views on domestic climate change policies and the Chinese government’s expectations and demands regarding COP17’s negotiations.

The document China’s Policies and Actions for Addressing Climate Change has high demands, but offers little in turn as a quid pro quo. It provides a lengthy description of the country’s efforts to curb emissions of greenhouse gases. And it is indeed a major endeavor. One that, by the way, could be easily turned into law-binding commitments under a new climate protocol.

“China is the world’s largest developing country, with a large population, insufficient energy resources, complex climate and fragile eco-environment. It has not yet completed the historical task of industrialization and urbanization and its development is unbalanced.”

As a developing country, China feels entitled to a waiver from any immediate mandatory obligations under a global climate change regime. Brazil and India share the same point of view.

“Climate change generates many negative effects on China’s economic and social development, posing a major challenge to the country’s sustainable development.”

The negative effects climate change has on China’s economic and social development shows it is a paramount global issue, and Beijing says that much: “climate change is a global issue of common concern to the international community. (…) It has become a main world trend that all countries join hands to respond to climate change and promote green and low-carbon development.”

The Chinese State Council says in this regard that “the most urgent task” in Durban, “vital to the conference’s success” would be to make clear as soon as possible “the emission-reduction plan for developed countries in the second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol (…) so as not to leave a space between the two commitment periods under the Kyoto Protocol, as is required by the Cancun Accord.” At the same time, Beijing expects that Durban approves an “emission reduction commitment under the UNFCCC for developed countries outside the protocol, which should be comparable with that of developed countries inside the protocol.” These commitments “should be comparable in terms of the nature and scope of emission reduction, and the compliance mechanism.”

The developing countries “should also actively reduce their emissions within the framework of sustainable development with funds and technological support from developed countries.” China, Brazil and India consider themselves to belong to this category, even though their governments do not really expect to get a significant share of the funds coming from developed countries.

Brazil’s chief climate change negotiator, Luiz Alberto Figueiredo Machado, told journalist Claudio Motta from O Globo newspaper that the Kyoto Protocol is the most important item on Durban’s agenda: “we are working with other countries to create the political conditions for a viable second period of commitment.” He also said that it is “important to ensure that we will take new steps forward. They may not be as large as we would like them to be, but we must not step backwards.”

The crucial point that could lead to a compromise comes as a conditional clause: “after developed countries assume their law-binding emission reduction targets under the UNFCCC and the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol, developing countries’ similar targets should also be clarified in the form of law, and their efforts for emission reduction should also be recognized.” The problem lies in the “after”. Even if the U.S. were prepared to accept a “law-binding” commitment in Durban on the wake of highly polarized presidential elections, Washington has made it clear that it would have to encompass all large emitters, including the “big three” developing countries, China, India and Brazil.

In other words a “law-binding” deal committing the advanced economies of the developing world would have to come concomitantly, not after the deal including all developed countries outside the Kyoto Protocol. But U.S. negotiators are unlikely to take any substantive new step towards closing a deal this year. Realistic expectations would set 2015 as the most probable date for a possible climate change accord.

The deadlock in Durban is likely to be centered on reciprocal vetoes from the developed U.S. and the developing China. “You first,” says China. “Not without you”, says the U.S. For China to move a step forward, the U.S. would also have to make a comparable move first. For the U.S. to move, China would have to come pari passu.

To be fully fair, Beijing is in a better position today to effectively move forward, than the U.S. The power transition in Beijing has already been solved. In the U.S. president Obama faces a though bid to get reelected.

If China makes a bolder move, Brazil and India would ultimately follow suit.

The Brazilian chief negotiator, Luiz Alberto Figueiredo, also told O Globo’s Cláudio Motta that the desirable deal would be one in which science determines the emissions reduction globally necessary to mitigate climate change, and the countries would share the responsibility to meet this goal committing to mandatory targets. It is a welcome view of a possible, though unlikely, future.

The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) countries may become a good example of how to deal politically with deadlocking issues. At their summit in Honolulu last week,they agreed to reduce import tariffs to boost trade in products that cut fossil fuel use and reduce pollution. 

With dismal expectations for the COP17 climate change talks, which will open in Durban, South Africa later this month, this agreement looks like a lesson on how to bridge differences and reach consensus. It could also somehow inspire the parties to the climate convention about to gather in South Africa. Durban’s COP17 risks provoking the collapse of the UN climate change negotiations architecture if it ends on a standstill.

The APEC meeting started with sharp differences between the U.S. and China. Opening statements from both countries’ leaders, Barack Obama and Hu Jintao, explicitly mentioned their disagreements. Obama even showed a trace of irritation with Chinese trade practices. “We’re going to continue to be firm that China operate by the same rules as everyone else,” he said at the close of the 21-nation APEC summit, after saying that “enough is enough”.  It looked like a deadlock would be unavoidable.

In his opening statement, Hu Jintao insisted on more clout for China as an emerging global power. He also made clear Beijing prefers to work through existing global trade architecture rather than allow itself to be subject to U.S.-led efforts to open Asia-Pacific markets at any cost. Chinese officials also warned that the U.S. decision to launch a probe that could lead to anti-dumping duties on Chinese-made solar cells and modules could impair energy cooperation within APEC.

But, at the end of the meeting, both countries managed to agree to cut import tariffs on environmental goods (mainly clean energy products) to 5 percent by 2015. APEC members also pledged to eliminate domestic content requirements that distort environmental goods and services trade by the end of 2012.

Additionally the APEC leaders agreed to:

* rationalize and phase out inefficient fossil-fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption, and set up a voluntary reporting mechanism on progress, to be reviewed annually;

* promote energy efficiency by taking specific steps related to transport, buildings, power grids, jobs, knowledge sharing, and education in support of energy-smart low-carbon communities; incorporate low-emissions development strategies into our economic growth plans and leverage APEC to push forward this agenda;

* a goal of reducing the region’s energy intensity by 45 percent by 2035;

* work to implement appropriate measures to prohibit trade in illegally harvested forest products and undertake additional activities in APEC to combat illegal logging and associated trade.

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Sergio Abranches

The BASIC countries have adopted a unified position ahead of Durban as their official negotiating stance. It points to the continuation of deadlocks on major issues that frustrated the official preparatory meetings this year.

Brazil, India, China, and South Africa met last Tuesday, November 1, in China and reached a consensus on global climate negotiations to begin later this month in Durban, South Africa. On a joint statement, the ministers of the four emerging nations said that the climate talks “should achieve a comprehensive, fair and balanced outcome” and “clearly establish the second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol”. The ministers stated that the Kyoto Protocol is “the cornerstone of the climate regime”, and called a second commitment period as the “the essential priority” for the summit’s success. Kyoto Protocol’s first commitment period ends in 2012.

This was the last meeting of the BASIC countries before Durban, and they did little more than to reiterate positions they’d already held on the preparatory meetings that ended on a cul-de-sac. The insistence on a second commitment period for the Kyoto Protocol means in fact that only developed countries should have legal responsibility for climate change policies and binding targets for greenhouse gas emissions reductions. As minister Jayanthi Natarajan from India made clear: “India is opposed to any legally binding cuts for developing countries”. Chinese and Brazilian officials have said that much on several occasions.

There has been some friction concerning South Africa’s stance on this point. South Africa’s partners shared the perception that its government was under pressure, as the host of COP17 and its acting president, to strike a balance between the BASIC and the developed countries on the need for a more encompassing, and biding, accord reaching all major GHG emitters.

South Africa’s lead climate negotiator, Alf Wills, sought clarify his country’s standpoint on legally binding emission reduction commitments to developing countries. It is a misunderstanding “that South Africa is advocating that developing countries take on quantified emissions reduction objectives,” he said. “We have always held the position that we will meet our legal obligation to take mitigation actions consistent with our respective common but differentiated responsibilities and our respective capabilities.”

He also said that South Africa shared the view that “the current Kyoto Protocol system, which elaborates those specific legal obligations that developed countries have in a multilateral rules-based system… provides the benchmark and cornerstone for any future climate change regime or system.”

The lack of differentiation between the poorer developing countries, and the advanced emerging economies serves as a convenient shield for these larger nations from binding commitments.

Developing countries are insisting on the Kyoto Protocol on purely ideological, and economic terms. The Protocol has achieved too little on emissions reductions under its first commitment period, if anything at all. Developing nations fear the developed ones would use the lack of a legal framework after the demise of the Kyoto Protocol to shied away from their obligations. They also fear that without the KP the mechanisms for investment and financial flows it contains, such as the Clean Development Mechanism, would be abandoned.

Only Europe seems today willing to be a part of it. Other major developed countries such as Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada have been announcing they would not join a second commitment period. The United States is already out of the reach of KP’s binding obligations. China, India, and Brazil want also to be out of the reach of any internationally binding emissions reduction treaty for as long as possible.

The corollary to their view on the Kyoto Protocol as the cornerstone of any future climate regime is that a new “comprehensive, fair and balanced” global climate agreement should not impose binding obligations to developing countries. In other words, this new agreement amount to extend to the U.S. binding provisions that hold for other developed countries in the Kyoto Protocol’s Annex I. But China, India, and Brazil, although leading emerging economies and major GHG emitters, should not be asked to abide by the new legal regime.

U.S. official negotiators have stated several times their country’s view that any new climate agreement would have to extend the reach of binding commitments to encompass China, India and Brazil at the very least. They admit a sort of proportionality rule based on “common but differentiated responsibilities”, but no exemption. Exemptions should be circumscribed to the poorer developing nations.

This polarization is likely to prevent diplomats in Durban from breaking the standoff that paralyzed negotiations all year long, and put the global climate talks on track again.

Sérgio Abranches

Large photovoltaic projects will cost half the current price in a couple of years, says a report by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. As the cost of generating electricity from the sun rivals coal-fueled plants, solar panel installations may grow strongly in the next two years, industry executives and analysts told Bloomberg News.

“We are already in this phase change and are very close to grid parity,” Shawn Qu, chief executive officer of Canadian Solar Inc. (CSIQ), said in an interview to Bloomberg News. “In many markets, solar is already competitive with peak electricity prices, such as in California and Japan.”

Chinese companies are making panels cheaper, fueled by better cell technology and more streamlined manufacturing processes. That’s making solar economical in more places and will put it in competition with coal, without subsidies, in the coming years, New Energy Finance said to Bloomberg News.

Installation of solar PV systems will almost double to 32.6 gigawatts by 2013 from 18.6 gigawatts last year, New Energy Finance estimates. Manufacturing capacity worldwide has almost quadrupled since 2008 to 27.5 gigawatts, and 12 gigawatts of production will be added this year. (Bloomberg)

China will double its solar capacity to around 2 gigawatts (GW) by the end of the year say reports by the local press quoted by Reuters. The solar feed-in tariff, the price of solar-generated electricity, could drop below 0.80 yuan for kilowatt-hour (kWh) (12.5 cents) by 2015, which would be on par with conventional coal-fired power tariffs by that time, according to a report by the Energy Research Institute, led by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), says Reuters.