THE EU has warned that it is neither balanced nor feasible for its 27 member states to sign up for a renewal of the Kyoto protocol without sufficient progress towards a more comprehensive, global solution to climate change.
At the conclusion of two weeks of UN climate talks, Jürgen Lefevere, the European Commission’s climate policy co-ordinator, said the EU was only responsible for 11 per cent of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions.
If the agreed target of limiting the increase in global temperatures at 2 degrees was to be achieved, “we need a solution for remaining 89 per cent as well”, he said on the final day of what is being seen as a constructive round of talks.
“We need to get real answers on how we can bridge the gap between the pledges [made under the 2009 Copenhagen Accord] and what’s needed”, Mr Lefevere said, referring to what other major emitters such as China and the US needed to do.
Many of the crunch issues had been “on table for two years already and we have had very little response”, he added. “We will need to see more to give us confidence that we’re moving in the right direction [by making further commitments].”
He said the EU was “ready for deal in Copenhagen, ready for a deal in Cancún and is ready for a deal in Durban” next December, but a renewal of the Kyoto Protocol alone “is not going to cut it. We need to bring other big emitters into a robust regime.”
Jozsef Feiler, representing the EU’s Hungarian presidency, said progress had been made in establishing the Green Climate Fund for developing countries and other issues and that “Bonn brought us a step forward to a balanced package at Durban”.
The EU “will continue to take a lead role in doing that”, he said, underpinned by its own efforts to move towards a low-carbon society by cutting its emissions by 20 per cent by 2020 – or by as much as 30 per cent “if all major emitters come on board”.
However, Tove Ryding of Greenpeace accused the EU of playing “climate poker”. Calling on the EU to raise its target to 30 per cent, she said: “It’s already reduced emissions by 17 per cent, so only reducing by a further 3 per cent is not climate leadership.”
Chief US negotiator Jonathan Pershing ruled out making any further commitments at this stage, beyond its target to cut emissions by 17 per cent by 2020. He also said the US was “not prepared to have a legal agreement that would apply to us and not to others”.
UN climate chief Christiana Figueres said global warming was “the most important negotiation the world has ever faced”, but she believed that governments, business organisations and civil society “can’t solve the climate with one single agreement”.
If the “ambitious” agreements reached at last December’s climate summit in Cancún were to be “made real”, she said “high-level political attention” to the issues – particularly the “essential task” of resolving the future of Kyoto – would be needed before Durban.
Ms Figueres said the South African presidency of the Durban summit was “very active” in consulting the various parties and this would continue over the next few months, including heads of state or government at the UN General Assembly in September.
A further round of climate talks is also being scheduled for the end of September, probably in Bangkok, to clarify outstanding issues – including “steps forward on a global mitigation framework, adaptation to climate change and sources of long-term funding”.
Alden Meyer of the Washington-based Union of Concerned Scientists said there needed to be a “clear commitment” by developed countries to go ahead with a renewal of Kyoto as well as a strategy to “close the gap” between pledges and the 2 degree target.
Durban also had to deal with the “potentially explosive” issue of measuring, reporting and verifying emissions cuts as well as “operationalising” the Green Climate Fund and finding “innovative sources of long-term finance to raise $100 billion a year by 2020”.
However, Tim Gore, Oxfam’s climate change policy adviser, said the US had “done its best [in Bonn] to block any meaningful discussion on the sources of climate finance from 2013 to 2020 and beyond . . . to help farmers in poor countries adapt to a warming world”.
