Over the next two weeks, attention will be focused on climate negotiations at the 20th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the results of which will be reflected in progress on the New Climate Agreement to be signed next year in Paris.
The hope of this new agreement is to close the gap in greenhouse gas emission reduction commitments in order to ensure that we reach the goal of limiting the temperature increase to 2°C. The current commitments made would place us in a reality that is more than 3°C above pre-industrial levels. To achieve this, all Parties to the Convention must make commitments to the Paris Agreement, and the definition of these has already begun through the preparation of Nationally Determined Contributions that must be submitted to the UNFCCC in March 2015.
It is important to emphasize that, although the world needs a definitive solution to limit CO emissions2, this will hardly be achieved with a new commitment. This is because, as is well known, climate and economy are directly related and have always placed developed and developing countries on opposing sides. We will therefore need common sense, and a lot of common sense.
We cannot expect the commitments in the new 2015 agreement to save the world. But we must expect countries to be willing to cooperate so that together we can achieve this goal, through progress in the years after 2015 on emissions reduction commitments, climate change adaptation plans, financial and technological cooperation, increased transparency in the fulfillment of officially assumed commitments, and continued capacity building to deal with climate change.
Less than 30 days ago, we saw an important move by the world's two largest GHG emitters towards a low-carbon economy. The United States and China made bilateral commitments to reduce emissions. The United States committed to reducing its GHG emissions by 26%-28% compared to 2005. China, on the other hand, committed to reaching peak emissions before 2030.
This movement certainly brings hope and is a very positive sign for the other countries that will sit at the negotiating table, although we still have to see what the willingness of both countries will be to repeat this proactive approach in Lima. We should expect that if both countries have committed bilaterally and believe that this Agreement is in fact a real contribution to the efforts of the UNFCCC, this will probably be repeated in a Multilateral Agreement. Right? We don't know. First, because the hallmark of climate negotiations has been, over all these years, the polarity between developed and developing countries.
And second, let us not forget that the recently elected US Congress is mostly made up of Republican representatives. It is worth remembering that these same Republicans were responsible for the non-ratification of the Convention during the Bill Clinton administration and for the US's withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol during the Bush administration. Have they begun to recognize the existence of climate change, the inherent risks to humanity and the urgency of taking decisions? This would undoubtedly be a great contribution to the world!
We must also better assess what the real contributions of this bilateral agreement are to the goal of limiting the temperature increase to 2°C by 2100. You see, all efforts to reduce emissions are necessary, but they must also be sufficient to achieve the 2°C goal and for this it is necessary that GHG emissions amount to 22 gigatons of CO2e in 2020 (today they are between 38-47 Gt of CO2), that is, global CO emissions2e are expected to peak before 2020!
We can only wait until March 2015 for the details of this bilateral agreement between the United States and China, and in the meantime, we will follow the official progress of the climate negotiations in Lima over the next two weeks.
CEBDS is leaving for Lima next Thursday! And the CEBDS delegation will include the companies Bradesco, Braskem, Cemig, Ecofrotas, Itaú, Schneider and Vale.
We'll meet here!
