Blog
15.December 2007 - 05:15
Results of Bali
Greetings again from the Bali Climate Conference. It is Saturday afternoon. According to the programme, the conference should now be over but it hasn’t finished yet. Being wiser from past experience, I reserved the return flight for much later so that this time I would be able to attend the final, prolonged but crucial session.
Since, honestly, the speeches of the plenary session have been routine and a total waste of time. All countries address the meeting with the same, imperative issues. The severity of the problem has been established and Australia has been praised for ratifying the Kyoto Protocol. Should the total duration of the applause that the Aussies received be estimated, it would be uncertain, whether 45 minutes would be enough.
The drama of the last session was increased by the US that announced first that that it can’t join the band, as well as China that demanded apologies when accusing the plenary session of having intentionally started its session at the same time as the minister of the country was negotiating somewhere else.
However, I do not have a clear enough picture as to who should apologise to whom and who should be embarrassed. Apparently, Indonesian domestic politics has confused and delayed the negotiations here, as its two ministers, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of the Environment, could not agree on their roles and, therefore, have both now negotiated on their own. Yvo de Boer, Director of the UN Climate Programme, was literally quite livid (he interrupted his short comment twice, as if he could not express himself in words) and said that he was sorry to hear that negotiations had taken place elsewhere.
There were also heated feelings to be heard in the speech given by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. He confessed to being disappointed and averse to the achieved results, and made an appeal to utilise the last-minute chances. “Your work is not yet over,” he appealed to the negotiators. “No delegation can push through everything that they would like, so please, compromise on your claims for the sake of mankind. I appeal to you to make the necessary decisions now.”
The speeches of other countries followed, especially those of developing countries. Several comments lashed out at the US, especially as the developing countries thought that they had made significant concessions. Papua New Guinea even suggested the removal of the US from the conference: “If you are not willing to lead, please do leave and get out of our way.”
At last the US expressed its approval and pointed out that they had desired efficient and successful climate politics all the time. The US wanted a whole new framework, a road map, which would enable, in the long run, efficient greenhouse gas reductions by 2050. The US assured the conference that it was striving for measurable and reportable goals and for such qualitative reduction objectives that take the economic circumstances into consideration.
A great deal of applause and relieved feelings followed this announcement.
Therefore, the Bali Conference decided to start new two-year negotiations on a more extensive global climate change agreement. The deadline for these negotiations was set at the Copenhagen Conference in 2009. The new negotiation track would include the US and the developing countries, which are not obliged by the present Kyoto Protocol to perform any kinds of emissions restrictions.
How should this be interpreted? The news is good but ideal. In my opinion, the EU was wise to not insist on the quantitative reductions objectives (some 25 to 40% were discussed), as otherwise it would not have been possible to get the US further involved. From the point of view of the final result, it is much more effective that the US is still involved even more than if only a small selected group of countries had continued with its one-sided restrictions and managed to cover just a fourth of all emissions.
However, the truth is that the EU still continues its one-sidedness, at least for the time being. The intention is to get back to the quantitative emissions restrictions in the later negotiations. In other words; unfortunately China, India and the US all remain open and we’ll see when it is that these countries take on similar obligations as the EU already now has.
Therefore, positive greetings from Bali – with some reservations.
P.S. A piece of news also reached Bali: Bob Geldof, our rock star who’s also known as a fighter against poverty, demands more nuclear power in the world in order to combat greenhouse effects. In his opinion, other measures will not be enough and he describes the use of renewable energy sources as “Mickey Mouse means” for curbing climate warming. Geldof is prepared to meet wide-scale opposition, but still states that neither wind nor water power is a long-term sustainable solution.
I wonder if Geldof really knows how intense the feedback will be concerning his statements. He will have to face a group of people who are immediately ready to forget and throw away all the good things that this man has ever said or done. Nuclear power is a matter of faith, it still arouses heated feelings and its supporters are being demonised – I know this, I have experienced it myself.
A funny thing was that the news from YLE ended with an uncritical comment “According to environmental organisations, nuclear power pollutes, and is dangerous and expensive”. It is funny, because nuclear power practically does not pollute at all; according to the statistics, it is clearly the most secure and inexpensive form of energy production when compared totally to the other alternatives.
Published: December 15, 2007
http://www.korhola.com/2007/12/balin-tuloksia/
Greetings again from the Bali Climate Conference. It is Saturday afternoon. According to the programme, the conference should now be over but it hasn’t finished yet. Being wiser from past experience, I reserved the return flight for much later so that this time I would be able to attend the final, prolonged but crucial session.
Since, honestly, the speeches of the plenary session have been routine and a total waste of time. All countries address the meeting with the same, imperative issues. The severity of the problem has been established and Australia has been praised for ratifying the Kyoto Protocol. Should the total duration of the applause that the Aussies received be estimated, it would be uncertain, whether 45 minutes would be enough.
The drama of the last session was increased by the US that announced first that that it can’t join the band, as well as China that demanded apologies when accusing the plenary session of having intentionally started its session at the same time as the minister of the country was negotiating somewhere else.
However, I do not have a clear enough picture as to who should apologise to whom and who should be embarrassed. Apparently, Indonesian domestic politics has confused and delayed the negotiations here, as its two ministers, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of the Environment, could not agree on their roles and, therefore, have both now negotiated on their own. Yvo de Boer, Director of the UN Climate Programme, was literally quite livid (he interrupted his short comment twice, as if he could not express himself in words) and said that he was sorry to hear that negotiations had taken place elsewhere.
There were also heated feelings to be heard in the speech given by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. He confessed to being disappointed and averse to the achieved results, and made an appeal to utilise the last-minute chances. “Your work is not yet over,” he appealed to the negotiators. “No delegation can push through everything that they would like, so please, compromise on your claims for the sake of mankind. I appeal to you to make the necessary decisions now.”
The speeches of other countries followed, especially those of developing countries. Several comments lashed out at the US, especially as the developing countries thought that they had made significant concessions. Papua New Guinea even suggested the removal of the US from the conference: “If you are not willing to lead, please do leave and get out of our way.”
At last the US expressed its approval and pointed out that they had desired efficient and successful climate politics all the time. The US wanted a whole new framework, a road map, which would enable, in the long run, efficient greenhouse gas reductions by 2050. The US assured the conference that it was striving for measurable and reportable goals and for such qualitative reduction objectives that take the economic circumstances into consideration.
A great deal of applause and relieved feelings followed this announcement.
Therefore, the Bali Conference decided to start new two-year negotiations on a more extensive global climate change agreement. The deadline for these negotiations was set at the Copenhagen Conference in 2009. The new negotiation track would include the US and the developing countries, which are not obliged by the present Kyoto Protocol to perform any kinds of emissions restrictions.
How should this be interpreted? The news is good but ideal. In my opinion, the EU was wise to not insist on the quantitative reductions objectives (some 25 to 40% were discussed), as otherwise it would not have been possible to get the US further involved. From the point of view of the final result, it is much more effective that the US is still involved even more than if only a small selected group of countries had continued with its one-sided restrictions and managed to cover just a fourth of all emissions.
However, the truth is that the EU still continues its one-sidedness, at least for the time being. The intention is to get back to the quantitative emissions restrictions in the later negotiations. In other words; unfortunately China, India and the US all remain open and we’ll see when it is that these countries take on similar obligations as the EU already now has.
Therefore, positive greetings from Bali – with some reservations.
P.S. A piece of news also reached Bali: Bob Geldof, our rock star who’s also known as a fighter against poverty, demands more nuclear power in the world in order to combat greenhouse effects. In his opinion, other measures will not be enough and he describes the use of renewable energy sources as “Mickey Mouse means” for curbing climate warming. Geldof is prepared to meet wide-scale opposition, but still states that neither wind nor water power is a long-term sustainable solution.
I wonder if Geldof really knows how intense the feedback will be concerning his statements. He will have to face a group of people who are immediately ready to forget and throw away all the good things that this man has ever said or done. Nuclear power is a matter of faith, it still arouses heated feelings and its supporters are being demonised – I know this, I have experienced it myself.
A funny thing was that the news from YLE ended with an uncritical comment “According to environmental organisations, nuclear power pollutes, and is dangerous and expensive”. It is funny, because nuclear power practically does not pollute at all; according to the statistics, it is clearly the most secure and inexpensive form of energy production when compared totally to the other alternatives.
Published: December 15, 2007
http://www.korhola.com/2007/12/balin-tuloksia/