China's announcement on Thursday that it will impose upon itself voluntary carbon cuts comes only hours after a similar statement by the United States. It seems unlikely the world’s two largest atmospheric polluters have acted independently. Clearly this was a subject discussed last week during President Barack Obama’s visit to Beijing.
All of a sudden optimists are daring to hope the Copenhagen climate summit, which begins in just ten days time, could after all produce a new treaty to succeed the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Only India of all the main carbon gas emitting countries has yet to offer its own commitments. Following the moves by China and the US, New Delhi will feel itself under considerable pressure to put something firm on the table in the Danish capital.
The fact that Obama will be joining many other world leaders at the climate summit does suggest that a substantive agreement could yet emerge, even though the international teams of draftsmen who have been working on various forms of words for much of this year, have until recently failed to discover a consensus.
There are, however, two reasons why those hopeful of a cast-iron Copenhagen outcome should not become carried away. The first is that a summit deal does not have to be definitive. Indeed, there are those who would argue that it is far better that a new climate treaty that is fair and workable emerges at some point after next month, than Copenhagen produces a document hedged with compromises and fudges. The message is that the climate deal has to be right. Rushing it, to meet what is essentially a political calendar, would be a mistake.
The fact that effectively every country is now focused on the climate issue and accepts the need for each to act means there is a clear momentum. Rather than agree half measures next month, it is infinitely preferable that the summit be used to clarify all the problems and produce binding agreements to tackle them just as soon as possible.
The second reason why a deal signed next month or successfully brokered for an early future date may still not be the right one, is far more fundamental. There is a body of respected scientific opinion that is insisting that even the radical proposals about to be tabled are simply not enough to reverse human impact on the planet by the creation of greenhouse gases.
It might be suspected that in part this warning is designed to keep politicians fully focused on reaching a deal. Nevertheless, if these scientists are right, even as world leaders seek to reach agreement on their current proposals, they should be acknowledging that even more needs to be done. Given that the time frame for existing proposed carbon gas emission cuts stretches out for the next ten years, it seems as if a new climate summit may be needed sooner rather than later. Perhaps, therefore, a key result of Copenhagen will be a permanent high-level consultative body with the power to review and push climate change mitigation even further.
