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After Copenhagen – Suspended Animation

Fortunately, none of the 120 or so heads of state in Copenhagen pretended that the climate talks in Copenhagen (the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change or “COP 15”) were a big success. Any attempt to greenwash these talks would have been a) insulting and b) a clear signal that the political will for a comprehensive, legally binding climate agreement had truly and completely evaporated.

Even the handful of countries that engineered the Copenhagen Accord acknowledged that the Accord was only one step in a still unfolding process. Yvo de Boer, the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, looking not very pleased at his press conference after spending much of the last ten hours in a “stuffy” room, called the Accord a “letter of intent.” So what actually happened at COP 15, and just as importantly what comes next?

One of the core issues before delegates at COP 15 was what constitutes a safe level of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations: 450 parts per million or 350 ppm? On this central point, the Copenhagen Accord is silent, missing a golden opportunity to establish 350 ppm as the objective. Maybe silence on was the best that could be done – at least the Accord didn’t set the level at 450ppm, which would have been a disaster.

The Accord states that its objective is to keep global temperature increases below 2°C – and holds open the possibility that a future review of the Accord will indicate the need to set the bar at 1.5°. That would be encouraging except for the fact that the review isn’t until 2016.

To stay below the 2°C threshold the Accord says that industrialized countries will reduce emissions by at least 80% by 2050. But 2050 is a long way off, and the Accord doesn’t say precisely when global emissions must peak. The science tells us that emissions must peak between and begin to decline between 2013-2017, but the Accord’s standard is simply “as soon as possible”.

On the critical question of which countries must reduce their emissions in the short term – and by how much – the Accord is as vague and non-binding as could be: it merely invites countries to inscribe their pledges of emissions reductions in the Accord’s annex by the end of January 2010. It will be interesting to see which countries do so, and what they sign up for. The good news is that for the first time, most countries, including the U.S. and many developing countries that have no obligations under the Kyoto Protocol, are willing to make public commitments to targets – these commitments won’t be binding even if they are added to the Annexes, but they will have at least symbolic value. The bad news is that analyses indicate that the commitments on the table won’t keep us below 2°C…

On finance, the accord confirms $30b in funding for mitigation and adaptation in developing countries over the next three years, pledges to raise $100bn annually for climate change mitigation by 2020, and calls for a High Level Panel to assess possible sources for adaptation funding. It also calls for a Copenhagen Climate Fund will be established under the Convention’s Secretariat. These sums are inadequate, but at least they represent movement towards something concrete.

On the issue of forests, the Accord recognizes the “crucial role” of reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation in developing countries, which is good, strong language. A decision by the COP specifically on REDD+ provides an additional ray of hope, making it clear that conservation must be part of the solution for climate change. The decision also mentions the importance of promoting activities that benefit biodiversity because those activities “may complement the aims and objectives of national forest programmes and relevant international conventions and agreements.”

That language is a far cry from the Mensaje de Merida, which calls for close integration in the implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity and the United Nations Framework on Climate Change. But it is the first time that this language has crept in to the UNFCCC’s decisions. Despite the somewhat convoluted articulation, it is a minor concession to common sense: the door has opened a tiny bit more to acknowledging the close link between biodiversity, wilderness and climate change.

That said, despite some encouraging language, REDD+ still has deep flaws: weak protections for the rights of indigenous peoples, no safeguards against logging in intact ecosystems, insufficient funding, and a high level of complexity which could delay implementation in many if not all countries. Nor did the Copenhagen Accord or COP 15 succeed in promoting protection of forests and wilderness areas in developed countries. In fact, had it not been for the heroic efforts of the NGO community, in particular WILD’s friends in the Ecosystems and Climate Alliance, the current perversities in the way developed countries deal with emissions from their forests would have been extended and even worsened.

So the Copenhagen Accord is a very, very weak document – extraordinarily weak for a Convention that has been in place for 17 years, and for a two year process that had such a strong mandate after the climate talks in Bali.

To make matters worse, the Copenhagen Accord is entirely non-binding, and despite its somewhat grand title, the Accord is not even a full COP 15 decision. The preamble merely states that the COP “takes note” of the Accord, which means that the Accord, as vague and non-binding as it is, doesn’t even represent a consensus view of the Conference of the Parties. It’s hard to imagine a UN body expressing its deep ambivalence on a given subject more clearly than that.

The Copenhagen Accord doesn’t quite represent a total collapse of the climate negotiations – but it’s close. The core objective of the UNFCCC – reaching a legally binding agreement that commits the entire global community to drastically reducing greenhouse gas emissions and to bringing atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations to safe levels – remains a distant goal.

With no agreement within reach, COP 15 had only option available, which was to mandate the continuation of the two track negotiating process in place since Bali: one track working on an extension of the Kyoto Protocol (under which developing countries have no obligations, and which does not include the U.S.) and one track for an alternative climate agreement that would complement or maybe even supersede Kyoto. No one has found a way forward to bridge the developed country – developing country divide and merge these two tracks. Tuvalu and its partners in the Association of Small Island States that are so vulnerable to rising sea levels had the moral leverage to do so, and they gave it their best shot, but they failed. So the unsuccessful two track approach continues: deadlocked and in a weird state of suspended animation.

With Copenhagen ending in near disaster, it’s difficult to imagine how, in a mere 12 months, and with only one inter-sessional negotiation, this stalemate will be resolved. It’s even harder to see how the international community will find the conviction it needs to move beyond sterile language and cumbersome bureaucratic mechanisms, and towards a bold vision where the full power of nature and wilderness is harnessed for both mitigation and adaptation.

The Mensaje de Merida attracted as many signatories as it did – over 80 NGOs and counting, including most of the largest in the world – not to mention some of the world’s leading conservationists – precisely because it attempts to carve out a space for a straightforward idea in a negotiating environment where clarity of vision is too often absent from the agenda. The message is not complicated: we cannot reduce our carbon dioxide emissions fast enough and avert dangerous climate change unless we protect our planet’s wilderness areas. But it has not yet been heard. WILD and its partners need to keep promoting the Mensaje.

Maybe our leaders will go home and reflect over the winter holidays about the fact that 45,000 people registered to attend COP 15, and another 100,000 demonstrated in the streets. Maybe the stunningly bad news on melting ice sheets and arctic sea-ice decline will begin to sink in. Maybe now that they have a little more time on their hands they’ll think about the fact that despite the Kyoto Protocol, global emissions are over 40% higher today than they were in 1990, that the Copenhagen Accord is weak, and that a radical new approach is now necessary.

We should not give up hope that a new way forward will somehow emerge from the wreckage of COP 15. Political will can be unpredictable and the politicians are surely aware that after Copenhagen public opinion is not on their side and the news on climate change is only getting worse. President Calderon of Mexico came to WILD9 and spoke with conviction of the clear linkages between wilderness and conservation. He also has reportedly expressed his desire for a different kind of process than the one we witnessed careening out of control in Copenhagen.

But nor should we count on COP 16 in Mexico to provide the solution: COP 16 may go the way of COP 15, and if it does so, absolutely no one will be holding their breath until COP 17. Maybe the most important lesson from Copenhagen for our leaders is that they shouldn’t be waiting for a new climate agreement to protect wilderness areas around the world. With or without a climate agreement, the time for leadership on climate change and wilderness conservation is now.

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