IE : India takes rich nations to task on emission norms : Aug 29, 2007

India takes rich nations to task on emission norms
Sonu Jain
Posted online: Tuesday, August 28, 2007 at 0000 hrs Print  Email

VIENNA, AUGUST 27: India, in a show of unusual aggressiveness, on Monday told a gathering of 1,000 policymakers gathered in Vienna that rich countries needed to take on “clear commitments” for emission reductions post-2012.
In a statement, they said that in the last 15 years, since the birth of the United Nations Framework on Climate Change, most of the countries had failed in this task. Emissions of most rich countries had gone up, instead of actually coming down. The week-long Vienna meeting is the last important meeting of this scale leading up to a major international climate summit in Bali, Indonesia, in December.

Yvo De Boer, UN head on climate change, said participants would “take the temperature” of global climate-control negotiations before two other key sessions that will precede the Bali conference, a September 24 meeting at UN headquarters in New York, and a meeting three days later in Washington of the world’s 15 biggest polluters, including the US, China and India.

The UN is trying to hammer out a successor agreement to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.

As the first meeting of the ad hoc working group of Annex I countries, India made its statement. “Despite their commitment, 15 years since the UN process has come into being, total emissions of Annex I parties have increased. Of the 24 Annex II countries, emissions of 16 have increased and only six countries registered reductions,” said the statement.
The EU has taken a lead in this respect by announcing their commitment levels (20 per cent) by 2020. “We appreciate this initiative on their part but would like to see unequivocal statements on part of other countries in Annex I of their intention of continuing with the binding Green House Gas (GHG) reductions in the period after 2012,” said India in its statement.

The Kyoto protocol required 35 industrial nations to cut their global warming emissions 5 per cent below 1990 levels by 2012. The European Union has set a new goal of reducing greenhouse gases by 20 per cent by 2020 and by another 10 per cent if other nations join in.
As India pointed out, the past record of developed countries is not much to cheer about.
“The data does not support appreciable progress regarding GHG reduction by Annex I parties (developed nations) with many projections showing that developed county emissions will actually increase by more than 20 per cent of their 1990 levels by 2020.”
India will present a paper this week that will talk of what it will cost to mitigate the effects of climate change. According to a senior member of the Indian delegate, India is already spending 2 per cent of its GDP in dealing with impacts of climate change like floods and droughts.

Despite pressure on India to take on more concrete commitments, the worldview seems to be more sympathetic now. It is being felt that that India could be a role model for good adaptation. A group 400 NGOs called the Climate Action Network (CAN) said that there was no pressure on India and China to take on any commitments at the moment.
“India has taken on commitments to expand renewable energy by 30 per cent by 2020,” said De Boer as an example of how the developing countries are doing their bit despite no legally binding commitments.

The developing world is looking towards India to take lead in calling for some real commitments from the rich countries. “So far, India has been very defensive in negotiations. It is in a position to take leadership in asking for deeper commitments from the rich world considering it is more vulnerable to impacts of climate change,” said Hans Verolme, director WWF’s Global Climate Change Programme and part of CAN.

Once, the rich nations agree on a range, there will be discussions on what policy options need to be exercised to arrive at those cuts. India is likely to play an important part there. “We believe that significant GHG reduction targets by Annex I parties would also really give a clear long term and strong signal to the private sector and spur the carbon market,” said India’s statement.

Publication : IE; Section : National Network; Pg : 13; Date : 29/8/07
URL  :http://newshopper.sulekha.com/news/2007/08/india-takes-rich-nations-to-task-on-emission-norms.htm