Climate Change And The Agenda For Research

Ted Hanisch

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9780429723315
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politique et relations internationales
• Subtopic: Politique

This book presents essays that address the most strategic questions and challenges to scientists and policymakers on the important subject of climate change based on issues discussed at the 1992 Earth Summit. It considers how best to meet the challenge that atmospheric pollution poses worldwide.

1
Introduction

Ted Hanisch

From the early days of the Brundtland Commission until the Rio Summit, policy makers and scientists have struggled with alternative global regimes to prevent dangerous changes in the atmosphere and elements of it. The discussion continued while the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), from 1989 to 1990, managed to sort out much of the discord in the sciences about climate change itself.

When we at CICERO considered the state of the situation here in Oslo after Rio in late June 1992, we insisted on starting our further work on climate change on the new platform created by the summit. We decided to invite a group of eminent, leading experts to assess the platform created by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC). We wanted to hurry forward on this basis, partly because we had tried to assist negotiators in their efforts with some success, and partly because we simply felt that too much literature had been speculating rather freely about possible climate regimes.

The global effort to prevent dangerous climate change is now well into its first phase of institution building. The platform was created by the UN Convention on Climate Change, signed in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992. Any UN convention of this sort is a framework for building new global institutions.

When negotiations concluded in New York in May 1992, the Climate Convention was criticized as non-binding and empty. As months passed, more experts tended to acknowledge that the Convention initiated a large political process which would last for a couple of decades. Patience is a necessity for all those who spend their time and intellect on global environmental problems.

The convention also unveiled real challenges to the academic community throughout the world. Many leading scientists have for years argued for action to limit emissions and preserve sinks and reservoirs of greenhouse gases. When their best assessment was summarized by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 1990 the political establishment generally accepted the challenge. But, as before, this raised more questions for the academic community, some of which were answered by 1993, and some which were not. This is true for the science of climate change as such, as well as for the scientific analysis of relevance to regulation and response strategies, i.e. the legal, institutional and economic aspects of the problem.

The CICERO seminar in 1992 focused on the agenda for research given the platform established by the Climate Convention. Until then, the academic community to a large extent had discussed its priorities in light of “possible climate regimes.” Since we at CICERO had been actively involved in advising negotiators in the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee, we were early to recognize the trailbreaking function of the convention.

We knew from studies made by our staff on global and regional environmental negotiations that the building of institutions has an organizational as well as a scientific side. When we look at the structure expected when the convention will enter into force probably by mid-1995, we see that much is needed before we have an institution capable of managing the regulatory process. Greenhouse gas emissions have an enormous number of sources, many of which can only be changed by measures of major economic significance. Conflicts of interest are likely to occur within nations and among nations, notably as targets grow firmer and higher.

From a scientific point of view there is a strong need to improve our understanding and empirical knowledge of the causes of climate change. There seems to be agreement among scientists that our best knowledge is sufficient for governments to decide on the first generation of measures. So-called “no regrets” options should be seen as a low insurance premium, given the dramatic and irreversible changes that may take place.

What is less known is whether we have sufficient knowledge and understanding of how governments should act most effectively. There are ambiguities about how governments should put priority on alternative response options to climate change and about how costs and benefits should be compared when it comes to responding now or later.

In this book a number of leading experts from all over the world offer their assessments on where we stand in the process of managing climate change, given the Climate Convention and our present status of scientific knowledge.

Calestous Juma and Edith Mneney start out with the fundamental issue of transfer of new technologies and the building of capacity in developing countries, particularly in Africa. For any long term and lasting approach to meet the challenge of Climate Change, this very practical issue should be on the agenda.

Dr. Juma and Ms. Mneney point to the major potential of existing technologies in reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Their argument is that the problem is rooted in the lack of availability. The main message is that technologies are rarely “transferred from the North to the South.” As a rule, communities with expertise in the South, given a technical capital base, are likely to fetch or purchase technology from the North. The issue of patents and licences, so tricky to deal with during multilateral negotiations, seems to be less important for building a basic technical competence. Rather, there is a need for basic technical capital and an institutional setting for it.

The authors also point to the biased focus in many studies of the lack of efficiency of development aid. They point on the other hand to the importance of national responsibilities in developing countries, given the fact that barely 5 percent of their GDP are extracted from foreign transfers.

Jane A. Leggett enters into the issue of monitoring and verification. The FCCC entails provision for National GHG inventories, reporting (providing information) about national policies, scientific cooperation and exchange of scientific data. These components could complement each other and support the efficiency of implementing the FCCC. Collecting this sort of information will be important in deciding whether response options and measures are sufficient and to what extent future revisions of the FCCC will be necessary.

National GHG inventories provide a basis for assessing total global emissions, alternative measures and the effects of them over time. In this area the IPCC and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) have done much of the basic work. Methods for assessing emissions of CO₂ from commercial carbon fuels and for most other GHG’s are available. However, for noncommercial fuels and non-energy related CO₂ emissions, data and methods are still underdeveloped.

With regard to information about national policies and measures, methods are not likely to be identical for all countries. One can only opt for comparability and coordination of assumptions built into the model studies of national policy options. Here we have a long way to go.

Dr. Eunice Ribeiro Durham writes in her chapter, “Climate Change Policies in Developing Countries,” on the responsibility put on developed countries by the FCCC. The principle of “a common but differentiated responsibility” is a major principle of the convention.

There are major differences in responsibilities and possibilities to participate within the group of developing countries. Dr. Durham argues that the largest four, namely Brazil, Indonesia, China and India, carry the responsibility to select development strategies with a view to the limitation of global environmental threats. In this respect the use of forests as carbon sinks is of intrinsic importance.

Through their decisive role in a global effort to limit emissions of GHG, particularly CO₂, these countries have a very strong bargaining position, as could be observed during the negotiations prior to UNCED. In the years to come this position could be used by governments to attract financial and technical support to choose less of the dangerous anthropogenic emissions than industrial countries in their development.

On the negative side, Dr. Durham notes that foreign interest, particularly multinationals, influence the use of resources in a way that may seem contrary to expressions of national sovereignty. They also often seem to face major problems of enforcing national policies in an effective way.

Dr. Rajendra K. Pachauri makes his approach to the role of developing countries from the energy angle. He sets out to assess how to meet energy needs in major developing countries with lower emissions under the regime of the FCCC.

Dr. Pachauri presents studies in support of a strategy that emanates from two realities: 1) There is an important but limited scope for improvement of energy efficiency in developing countries, and 2) efficiency gains should first take place in the North, where most of the best technology is produced.

Assessing existing studies of the potential of alternative energy sources and emissions of GHGs well into the next century, for Asia in general and India in particular, Dr. Pachauri is able to show that there are no easy shortcuts available. The sort of practical grip that energy experts have is of vital necessity to any realistic effort to limit emissions of GHGs.

On the other hand, Dr. Pachauri argues strongly that there are major opportunities to be identified. He also points to what may be gained by a joint implementation of effective measures by developed and developing countries as provided for in the FCCC. His point is that the elements of fear and skepticism which governments in major developing countries in Asia still face can only be overcome by positive experience of North-South co-operation. It is only natural that developing countries regard removal of poverty as the most important element in any strategy for protecting the global environment.

In “Socially Efficient Abatement of Carbon Emissions,” Dr. William R. Cline argues that a large-scale and long-term program for major reductions is actually profitable on the macro level. The major contribution from Cline is his insistence on including in his calculations the long-term dramatic changes in the atmosphere due to maximum concentrations of GHGs and their social costs. His major criticism of previous studies is that the often-used time horizon of 50 years is systematically misleading and it draws our attention away from the major threats.

For this reason Cline uses a 300-year horizon in his calculations, proving dramatically the increase in damage costs of climate change and thereby the benefits of mitigation. On the other hand, this long horizon underlines how vulnerable the studies are to the right assessment of future technological change. It is hard to know what technologies we will have available by the year 2100 and later.

Recognizing the imminent difficulties of all such very long term studies, Dr. Cline’s chapter is very relevant and valuable input to the sort of broad discussions policy makers need to go through while developing the practical steps in their national strategies and their cooperative efforts.

In the chapter by Dr. Arild Underdal, and in the three subsequent chapters we enter into issues more relevant to what has been achieved by the FCCC as such and what the Parties to the convention might achieve throughout this decade and the next.

Dr. Underdal raises the discussion: What is more important, the legal commitments to limit emissions of the UNCED and the FCCC as they now stand or the process of communication and cooperation? His argument is that international attempts to manage problems do have positive effects, regardless of the substantive decisions which they entail.

He continues by arguing that, first, the solving of problems is more than just making decisions. It also implies learning, identification and diagnosing of new phenomena. Second, joint or coordinated efforts are only one part of the total “climate policy.” Unilateral decisions will always encourage international process. Third, nations respond to environmental problems not only through their governments; other important channels of influence are producers’ and consumers’ behavior.

When considering what matters, it is also necessary to ask what commitments are really to be found in the FCCC. Dr. Rudolf Dolzer carefully examines the text and his conclusion may be surprising to those who only read the headlines in May and June 1992.

As Dr. Dolzer points out, the contention that the FCCC does not entail any substantive commitments is simply misleading. The signatories are committed legally to strive for certain goals, i.e. reduce the level of GHG-emissions by the year 2000 to the level of 1990. Further, the parties are pledged to adhere to certain principles in the policies, particularly the precautionary principle.

Commitments in the FCCC are also pointed out in Jane A. Leggett’s chapter in the discussion on procedures for providing reports and scientific information. The developed country parties are also dedicated to covering the full and agreed incremental costs of the commitments taken on by developing country parties.

Dr. Dolzer’s conclusion is that the commitments, even though legally binding, are open for interpretation in a way that may reduce their short-term effect. On the other hand, the FCCC is bound to have a bearing on future policies and certainly its principles will be guidelines for future amendments of the FCCC.

The questions then arise: What can governments do to set out a strategically sensible set of measures? Do we have methods to assess what are the right priorities?

Michael Hoel and Ivar S. A. Isaksen enter into this very complicated matter by presenting a model of an alternative to the so-called GWP index (index of the global warming potential of each greenhouse gas).

They argue that a cost effective policy should take all gases into account, a comprehensive approach. While the GWP developed and used by the IPCC only calculates the direct effect of each gas, with a view to their life cycle in the atmosphere, the new model calculates the damage effect measured by increased temperature, with the possibility of testing alternative discount rates. The more weight we put on the interest of future generations, the more we should concentrate on gases with a long lifetime in the atmosphere.

The results of the calculations differ to some extent from what emerges from the IPCC GWP-index. When their method is improved, one should think it would be valuable for a practical approach to the difficult decisions on priority. In one respect it may seem easy to agree that “the problem must be solved.” With limited resources, as usual it is not easy to decide what steps to take next year and why not some other measures?

The other important issue for international cooperation which is discussed by the editor is the importance of burden sharing within the group of signatories. During the pre-UNCED negotiations most of the discussion centered on the North-South dimension of burden sharing. Since developed countries will have to carry most of the costs in the foreseeable future, the sharing of burden within the OECD group will in reality prove more important.

The argument here is that the FCCC does not fully recognize the way differences in energy systems, resource bases and industrial structure are decisive for the relative cost of numerically similar limits to emissions. Countries with relatively old-fashioned energy systems will have much lower costs for a certain target than those with more modern systems or countries with a high proportion of renewable energy.

If one combines the “polluter pays” principle with the “grandfathering” principle (i.e. same reduction in percent for all OECD countries), the FCCC will punish those parties who in the past have done the most to limit GHG emissions and acid rain, and support those who have done the least. For further progress, improvement of this weakness is important.

To some extent the unresolved problems of burden sharing can be overcome by the mechanism for “joint implementation of commitments,” provided for in the FCCC. By this mechanism of governing, countries where marginal costs are among the highest can choose to cooperate with countries where low-cost alternatives are available and implement some of their measures abroad.

Dr. T. M. L. Wigley makes an assessment of the state of the art of our knowledge of the different greenhouse gases and their contribution to climate change.

First, Wigley discusses the carbon cycle and what uncertainties we have to face. He uses a carbon cycle model to assess what importance the imbalance (the missing sink) actually has with regard to calculation of future CO₂ concentrations and changes in temperature. His conclusion is that carbon storage actually may be larger than calculated so far, due to “CO₂ fertilization” of biomass growth. The size of this effect is, however, difficult to ascertain, and, because of that, calculation of future CO₂ concentrations is very uncertain.

In his second contribution Wigley sets out to assess what holes in our knowledge we should try to eliminate first; where it is most important to know more. Wigley makes reference to studies which show that reducing uncertainty may be more profitable as a measure than reduction of emissions beyond the no-regrets limit.

I can only hope that these initial remarks sharpen the reader’s appetite for reading the chapters themselves. At CICERO we were all confident that contributing to the science and policy of handling climate change is a task only for the patient among us.

With this book we hope to have been able to combine solid scientific knowledge with a practical understanding of realistic policy options. At the sam...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• About the Contributors
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Environmentally Sound Technology Transfer and Capacity Building in Africa: Strengthening Incentive Systems
• 3. National Greenhouse Gas Inventories and Other Information to Implement the Framework Convention on Climate Change
• 4. Climate Change Policies in Developing Countries and the Role of Multilateral Institutions
• 5. Meeting the Demand for Energy in Major Developing Countries in Asia With Lower Emissions: What Support May Be Provided by the New Regime?
• 6. Socially Efficient Abatement of Carbon Emissions
• 7. Progress in the Absence of Substantive Joint Decisions? Notes on the Dynamics of Regime Formation Processes
• 8. The Legal Status of the Commitments in the Convention on Climate Change and the Need for Future Revisions
• 9. Efficient Abatement of Different Greenhouse Gases
• 10. The Need for Cost-Effectiveness and Flexible Implementation of the Climate Convention and Subsequent Protocols
• 11. How Important Are Carbon Cycle Uncertainties?
• 12. The Contribution From Emissions of Different Gases to the Enhanced Greenhouse Effect
• About the Book