Climate Change Disagreements and Predictions

At the meeting in Tianjin, China, the final formal climate change summit before the Cancun conference, the media were surprised to see some of the delegates in attendance, even though some of the issues from the 2009 Copenhagen agreement remain unresolved.

For example, themes like short-term financial assistance to countries vulnerable to climate change or the monitoring of emissions by large economies now seem — in the opinion of experts who have closely followed the results of the 2009 Copenhagen conference — more distant in their fulfillment than they appeared at the end of the event.

Thus, the signatories from the “rich” world committed to raise some $100 billion within the next decade as assistance to the “developing” world threatened by climate disasters, further designating $30 billion of that amount as “fast-start funding” to be available around the year 2012. But, notwithstanding that those funds have barely begun to flow, many of those “potential climate victims” are now seeking for the rich countries to increase the funds … that is, in keeping with the perennial disagreement between poor and rich nations.

This situation can be summarized thus: Countries with large economies are demanding the big emerging countries (China and India) [to make] the sensible and verifiable cut in their carbon emissions, while the poorest seem to be demanding both the richest and the emerging giants not only take seriously the problems of their own emissions, but at the same time increase the “generous cash bag.”

This peculiar situation brings us to the Cancun summit, in process this week.

Very modest is the noise that Cancun has caused in the media. This may be some effective strategy of the organizers, together with the Mexican government: to opt — through responsible discretion — to fail to confront disappointments like those experienced in Copenhagen, an occasion given media coverage never before seen for events of that nature.

Either way, it is almost certain that at the end of this week, we will begin to receive updates on “advances” and “achievements” from the event taking place on the Mexican Caribbean. As for predictions, we can perhaps make educated guesses starting from reflections offered before the summit:

“What we should strive to ensure is that we do not backslide,”* said Connie Hedegaard, the EU’s Commissioner for Climate Action. She suggests a focus on the least contentious topics, like preservation of the world’s forest reserves or renewing the voluntary commitments made in the Copenhagen agreement, assuring at least some degree of movement instead of inertia.

*Editor’s Note: This quote, accurately translated, could not be verified.