By Frazer Lanier, Humanitas Global Development
The media is projecting steady progress toward climate
change negotiation goals this week in Doha, Qatar at the 2012 UN Climate Change Conference. In most international
negotiations such news would be excellent; slow steps towards the creation of a
complex treaty that everyone can live with. While climate change negotiations
move at the glacial speed of global politics, global warming is destroying real
glaciers, resulting in rising seawaters – impacting hundreds of millions of
people in low-lying areas. Global warming is also causing extreme weather
events like droughts and floods which are an increasing threat to everyone,
particularly the poorest and most vulnerable.
This week in Doha there will likely be a continued commitment to work toward the following:
- Binding emissions targets by 2015,
- Progress towards consensus on measuring and verifying carbon offsets from Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) projects
- Reaffirmation of the persistent commitment toward the Green Climate Fund that will hopefully distribute $100 billion per year to help developing countries deal with and mitigate climate change by 2020 (if countries abstain from creative accounting procedures).
These are progressive steps toward a positive solution; unfortunately they are too little too late. Given the amount of carbon dioxide already emitted into the atmosphere and the fact that carbon dioxide stays in the atmosphere for about 100 years, the “safe” climatic increase of 2 degrees Celsius, which scientists insist is the average global temperature increase acceptable to avoid catastrophic climate change, and the amount of increase to which countries pledged at the Climate Negotiations in Copenhagen, is now an impossible goal.
The world’s green house gas emissions (GHG) rose by 3% last year, stemming overwhelmingly from China. Meanwhile the Maldives Islands have begun officially saving revenue to invest in a new homeland in Australia or New Zealand in anticipation of being the first nation on earth to be submerged by rising seawaters.
In the U.S., Colorado experienced deadly forest fires this past summer. Hundreds of thousands of square miles of dead and dry pine forests have been turned to kindling by pine beetles, which no longer freeze during the winter due to higher winter temperatures across the Rocky Mountains. The dead wood combined with severe drought ignited deadly flames through suburban neighborhoods in Colorado Springs.
Superstorms like hurricane Sandy will become a more frequent occurrence as the combination of higher waters, warmer ocean temperatures and off-schedule pressure zones combine to create extra-normal extreme weather events. Climate Change is no longer a hypothetical occurrence of the future, it is happening right now, to every one of us and its consequences are deadly not to mention prohibitively costly.
Climate Change is a human development issue for the developed and developing worlds alike. At Doha, countries like the United States and China must cease bickering over who is historically responsible for emissions and who is thus responsible for stopping it. The world must seize the opportunity to create a new clean development approach in all hemispheres. While the United States and Germany boast decreasing greenhouse gas emissions, China’s industry is spewing out more CO2 and exporting its fossil fuel soaked goods to the very countries claiming decreased emissions. Without a Chinese commitment to massive renewable energy investment, decreases in the developed world will be partially attributed to increases in China, India and other countries, to which manufacturing has migrated.
There are many potential solutions for mitigation and adaptation to climate change – from more sustainable agricultural methods, to decreased deforestation, to shutting down coal fired power plants and investing in wind energy. Doha is a step forward on the path toward a global agreement and negotiators are discussing in great detail the aforementioned issues. But at the current rate of progress, the world can expect a 4 degrees Celsius increase in temperature and a 1-foot rise in sea levels by 2100, according to the World Bank’s recent report.
Another report by PriceWaterhouse Cooper (PwC) argues that for the world to comply with its 2 degree promise, we need to immediately commit to the radical restructuring of the world economy into one based on renewable energy, adopt carbon capture and storage technology and completely halt deforestation. If Doha is to be a success, PwC’s proposal is the one that needs to be on the table. The greatest economies on earth, particularly China and the United States, need to assume their role as global leaders, pledging to take unprecedented steps, not incrementally, but immediately.
