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Bali, Wednesday 12.12.07

A worrying turn in the negotiations

On Monday and Tuesday many people whom we met were very optimistic and hopeful for good outcome from Bali, even representatives of environmental NGOs. On Tuesday the President of this conference, the Environment minister of Indonesia, had tabled the second draft proposal for the decision to formally launch the negotiations of the next climate agreement, or post 2012 climate framework. The draft proposal contained many important elements.

When the civil servant negotiators discussed the proposal yesterday evening, all paragraphs of the draft were opened. The discussion ended several hours after midnight in a complete mess.

I must say that yesterday and day before, when I listened to the optimistic comments, I had the feeling that this is too good to be true. And it was not true.

The hope is not totally lost, however. It has happened also before in climate conferences that just before ministers arrive, the civil servants table all possible hardliner positions. The hard decisions are made by the ministers. The ministerial session was formally opened today.

But this situation means that it is not at all granted that there will be a sufficient outcome from this conference to make it possible to have the next climate agreement in time, not leaving a gap between Kyoto and the next step.

The role of USA deserves a specific remark. USA seems to act in a completely double faced way. To the media and observers they say that their country has changed they are now very flexible and positive. But in the negotiating rooms they table exactly the same bad proposals as before.

Many people, however, speculate that in the end USA does not want to be the sole culprit for failure in the negotiations. This means that if all other countries can agree then probably they will not block the decision. But this is of course just speculation.

The biggest open questions are basically the same as before. First, if developing countries agree opening negotiations on their future emission commitments. Second, if USA commits itself to mandatory targets. These questions are linked together. The developing countries of course – and rightfully so – want to have a commitment of USA before they promise to agree any kind of limitations to their emissions. And USA does not agree to anything without emission limits for major developing countries. In this situation the EU has a very important role of bridge builder.

The developing countries have tabled a proposal on a new fund to finance so called technology transfer. This means helping developing countries to accelerate the market breakthrough of climate friendly technologies. I feel, and this seems to be shared by MEPs from other political groups, too, that EU should be positive to this proposal. It is anyway quite clear that the rich countries have to pay some compensation for developing countries for the fact that so far we it is mainly our countries that have caused climate change, and that emissions per capita in the rich countries are far more than those even in China, not to speak of India and African countries.

Yesterday MEPs met Achim Steiner, the Director General of UNEP (UN Environment Program). He stressed that the polluter pays principle which we have adopted as one of the guiding principles in environmental policy, must be the principle in climate protection, too. The rich countries simply have to accept this. Steiner, and many others whom we have met, has said that the decision by EU to reduce our emissions by 30 % as a part of a global agreement and 20 % even alone by 2020, has really pushed the negotiations forward. This is the first major offer of any of the major players. Steiner also pointed out that many positive things are happening in China. They open 2 coal fired power stations per week. But many of these replace older and much more polluting power stations. India has invested in renewable energy before the word was known in Europe, and is one of the leading wind power nations in the world.

The MEPs are having many kinds of meetings, and the purpose of these is to promote the negotiations. Globe EU, a cross-party group of MEPs, has organized two interesting dialogue events. The first was on Tuesday on “overcoming barriers for clean technology” and the second was today on adaptation to climate change. The European Parliament arranged today a roundtable for parliamentarians on global carbon markets. All these meetings, and many others, have been very interesting.

Bali, Monday 10.12.07

A meeting with senator Kerry

The MEPs who are already in Bali had a meeting with senator John Kerry on Monday morning.

Kerry had come to Bali to convince other nations that the policy of President Bush does not represent the whole USA. More than half of US citizens and 50 % of the US economy are in states, which have state level emission limits. He assured us that the thinking and policy of USA are changing. For example the Environment Commitee of the Senate just a couple of days ago supported a CO2 cap and trade law for USA.

He said several very positive things, there must be and end date for negotiations on Post 2012 climate framework, no later than 2009, and the scheme must be mandatory. The advice of science must be followed, global warming needs to be limited below 2 degrees compares to pre-industrial time.

Kerry also thanked EU for keeping the international climate process alive, for ratifying Kyoto and encouraging others to do so, even with the absence of USA.

But disappointing was his refusal to discuss the equity issue, the historical burden of the present day rich countries. He did not really answer my question on how China and other developing countries should be compensated for taking emission limits, anyway the emissions per capita in China are one third of those in EU and a smaller fraction of emissions in USA. He just said that " this is not a per capita issue" .

Later on Monday we heard from the Green Senator Christine Milne from Australia that the new Australian government has refused to stop a massive logging project in ancient forests of Tasmania. Scientists have estimated that there is 1400 tons of carbon per hectare in the forest of the Styx Valley, and logging will bring 60 % of that carbon in the atmosphere. 200 000 ha is given to a new pulp factory. Environmentalists have demanded cancelling of the permission, because in the environmental impact assessment the CO2 emissions are not taken into aacount. The new Australian government has refused to reconsider the permission.

The logging machines have been sent to Tasmania on the same day, when the new minister for environment came to Bali, to convince Indonesia to protect their tropical forests.