Tag: common but differentiated responsibilities

LULUCF: Are We Outraged Yet?

Submitted by Anonymous on November 28, 2011 - 11:50pm

One of the most important principles in the climate negotiations is that of common but differentiated responsibilities. CBDR means that while it is everyone’s job to reduce emissions, Annex I Parties have the lion’s share of historical emissions and therefore should demonstrate leadership with more ambitious emission reductions.

Specifically, to have a chance of keeping warming below 2° C, Annex I Parties must reduce emissions 40% or more below 1990 levels by 2020, while developing countries should begin low-carbon development that rapidly diverges from their likely business-as-usual (BAU) emissions.

How on earth, then, do Annex I Parties justify accounting for their forest industry emissions against BAU levels, and not a much more ambitious benchmark. And as you might have guessed, it’s even worse – many of these proposed BAU reference levels are inflated to hide future emissions increases, and so are worse than “real” BAU.

How is it that Annex I ministers and heads of delegation have allowed a whole sector to avoid contributing a fair share of ambition? Seriously, this isn’t some obscure technical issue. It’s a basic point about whether the forest sector is helping to solve the problem or is just a free-loader.

Furthermore, how hypocritical is it for Annex I Parties to set forest reference levels with no ambition for themselves, and then include calls for ambition in their recent submissions on the evolving REDD+ mechanism?

If you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention!

And yet there is still time here in Durban and there are better options in the LULUCF text. These options may not be perfect, but they are better than Annex I countries’ wholly unacceptable projected BAU reference levels.

Come on, LULUCF negotiators and heads of delegations! It’s not enough to deliver a set of rules everyone can agree on. These rules must neither undermine the integrity of the KP nor set damaging precedents that could see ambition undermined in other areas. Clearly they must deliver for the climate – and time is running out!

Tags:

common but differentiated responsibilities

Business as usual

Topics:

Forests-Sinks

Related Event:

COP17/CMP 7 – Durban

Anonymous's blog

CAN Position - Effort Sharing Principles - Nov 2011

Submitted by Anonymous on November 20, 2011 - 9:14pm

CAN_effort_sharing_principles_position_paper_22September2011.pdf

Countries agreed in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to prevent dangerous climate change: to allow ecosystems to adapt naturally to climate change, to ensure that food production is not threatened and to enable economic development to proceed in a sustainable manner. At present they are failing in this task. One element holding back countries from the necessary action is the concern that they will be asked to do more than is their fair share, and conversely that other countries will ‘free ride’ off their effort. A common understanding of fair shares – even if it is only approximate – can help overcome this trust barrier and lead to higher levels of ambition from all.

CAN recommends to parties and the AWG Chairs that they take steps to proactively insert effort sharing into the negotiation framework in 2011 and 2012. COP17 should establish a mandate to agree an equitable effort sharing approach between all countries by COP18. Whilst an agreement on an equitable effort sharing approach should be the ultimate aim, any discussions that expand the shared understanding of a fair effort sharing approach have the potential to move the negotiations forward exponentially. Waiting for these discussions to take place is not, however, an excuse for countries to put off increasing their level of ambition. All countries[1] have an obligation to increase their ambition now – developed countries, with their woefully inadequate pledges, most of all.

[1]except for the Maldives and Costa Rica who are developing countries that have committed to becoming carbon neutral.

Tags:

common but differentiated responsibilities

right to sustainable development

adequacy

comparability of effort

Precautionary

Principle

R2SD

Topics:

Equity/effort-sharing

Organization:

Climate Action Network

CAN Positions

UNFCCC

CAN Discussion Paper - Fair Effort Sharing - Jul 2011

Submitted by Anonymous on July 25, 2011 - 1:30am

CAN_effort_sharing_discussion_paper_25July2011_v2.pdf

In the UNFCCC countries agreed to prevent dangerous climate change: to allow ecosystems to adapt naturally to climate change, to ensure that food production is not threatened and to enable economic development to proceed in a sustainable manner.

At present they are failing in this task. One element holding them back from the necessary action is the concern that they will be asked to do more than is their fair share, and conversely that other countries will ‘free ride’. A common understanding of fair shares – even if it is only approximate – can help overcome this trust barrier and lead to higher levels of ambition from all.

This paper adds to the understanding of what an equitable effort sharing agreement might look like. It outlines the fundamental effort sharing principles contained in the UNFCCC and expands on these principles, presenting an organized set of fundamental and subsidiary principles relevant to assessing fair-share effort-sharing frameworks. It briefly describes thirteen existing frameworks and assesses these frameworks against effort sharing principles.

Topics:

Equity/effort-sharing

Finance

Mitigation

Organization:

Climate Action Network

CAN Positions

UNFCCC