Hansen wants Copenhagen to fail: here’s why it will

A leading climate scientist is so disillusioned with the forthcoming Copenhagen summit that he has said he hopes it will fail. He is James Hansen, head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, who arguably did most to raise awareness of climate change in the first place when he testified to the US Congress in 1988.

Hansen is an implacable opponent of the kind of compromise embodied by carbon trading schemes, which aim to reduce emissions by pricing the cost of pollution into goods and services. The European Union sees such schemes as the best way to cut global carbon emissions, but Hansen compares them to the indulgences dished out by Catholic bishops to rich sinners in the Middle Ages.

"This is analogous to the issue of slavery," he told the Guardian. "On those kind of issues you cannot compromise. You can't say let's reduce slavery, let's find a compromise and reduce it 50 per cent."

Referring to COP15, the Copenhagen summit, which runs for two weeks from December 7, he said: "I would rather it not happen if people accept that as being the right track, because it's a disaster track.

"The whole approach is so fundamentally wrong that it is better to reassess the situation."

Judging by the stated negotiating positions of the key blocs involved in the summit, Hansen's wish is very likely to come true. Here are four key issues, and the reasons why each one could scupper COP15.

Cutting carbon emissionsScientists say that cuts of 25-40 per cent on 1990 levels by 2020 are needed in order to avoid the catastrophic effects of an above-2°C global temperature rise. And while the big four polluters - the EU, US, India and China - have all outlined their opening negotiating positions on reductions in carbon emissions, their proposals still fall short.

The EU has offered to slash its carbon emissions by 20 per cent by 2020, while the US has offered a 17 per cent cut. However, the European offer is significantly more generous, since its cuts are measured against 1990 emissions; the US is using 2005 as its base measurement. European nations are also offering to increase their cuts to 30 per cent - if other developed nations match the 20 per cent figure.

China and India, because they are developing countries that need to grow their economies to lift their people out of poverty, will not be expected to make real cuts in carbon emissions. Instead, they are offering 'carbon intensity' reductions - the amount of carbon released relative to economic growth. So, China will reduce its carbon emissions per unit of GDP by between 40 and 45 per cent of 2005 levels by 2020, while India will reduce its carbon intensity by 24 per cent.

Another ambition, put forward by the Danes, is for global emissions to peak by 2020, a target that India opposes.

Footing the bill for cutting carbon emissionsDeveloped nations will have to pay for poorer countries to adopt green technologies and cope with the effects of climate change, such as drought and flooding.

India has suggested that developed nations should pay one per cent of their GDP towards paying for green technologies - about $400bn per year.
However, a British diplomat dismissed this in June as "obviously a fantasy figure".

In the same month, Gordon Brown said that by 2020, rich countries should spend $100bn a year to fight climate change. A compromise, suggested by the EU, of about $150bn seems most likely. However, Lord Stern of Brentford, who wrote a highly influential analysis of the costs of climate change in 2006, believes that we may have to spend up to 5 per cent of global GDP on the issue.

But even if an agreement on funding is thrashed out, the question of who should distribute the funds is highly controversial. Rich nations favour the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, but poorer nations are suspicious of these bodies and would rather the United Nations was in charge.

Monitoring of carbon cutsRelatively little has been heard from the key players regarding how carbon cuts will be monitored and enforced. But perhaps that is understandable, since it was this issue that kept the United States out of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol.

That treaty, which expires in 2012, committed rich countries to legally enforceable cuts - although in practice, only Greece has ever been punished for failing to meet its emissions target. Canada is yet to pay any penalty for its 22 per cent rise in emissions, despite committing to a six per cent reduction at Kyoto.

Despite its limitations, developing countries want to continue that regime of penalties for failure to meet cuts. The 53 Commonwealth nations have said "an internationally legally binding agreement is essential", although its biggest member, India, has since said it won't sign up to legally enforceable cuts - mainly because this time round they could in theory be penalised for failing to cut their carbon intensity.

The fact is there is little hope of a legally enforceable treaty emerging from Copenhagen. And as in 1997, the US is likely to be the main stumbling block. President Barack Obama is hamstrung by a bill that would cap the country's carbon emissions, which is still making its way through Congress. He cannot agree to anything that may prejudice the delicate negotiations surrounding its passage.

Reducing deforestationDeveloping countries with large rainforests are pushing for rewards to preserve their trees, which are an important natural means of absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Brazilian president Lula da Silva has said: "We want to preserve [the forests], but [other countries] have to pay for that preservation."

But any agreement will be difficult because of practical problems surrounding verification and the question of whether any given forest would have been chopped down anyway.

The issue's importance has also significantly decreased. The Global Carbon Project estimates that although deforestation accounted for 20 per cent of anthropogenic carbon emissions between 1990 and 2000, that figure has fallen to 12 per cent between 2000 and 2008. This will give forested nations much less traction in negotiations at Copenhagen.

a reason for hopeMost interested parties now see Copenhagen as a colossal talking shop to thrash out these key issues in preparation for the next climate conference in Mexico City a year from now, which they hope will result in a legally binding successor to the Kyoto Protocol. ·