The eventual outcome was the Copenhagen Accord. "We sealed the deal and it is the real deal," UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon told reporters. "Everyone didn't get everything [they] hoped for, but this decision is an essential beginning. We will try our best to turn it into a legally binding agreement as soon as possible, possibly in 2010."
It was not formally accepted by the conference because of objections from a handful of countries. Instead, the conference "took note" of the accord, also unprecedented for the UN climate process, although UN officials said taking note is the legal equivalent of formal acceptance. "It is a way of recognizing something is there" without having to accept any or all of its provisions, said Yvo de Boer, the UN top climate official.
Under the accord, the US and major developing countries, including China and India, would for the first time record their emission reduction commitments in an international agreement. (The Bush administration rejected the Kyoto Protocol, which mandates emission reductions for every other industrial country through 2012 but exempts developing countries).
For the US and other developed countries, the accord calls for the submission of quantified, economy wide emissions targets for 2020. Developing countries would submit "appropriate mitigation actions." Submissions are due by January 31. The countries expected to submit pledges under the non-binding accord account for about 80% of total global greenhouse emissions. Nations under the binding Kyoto protocol account for 30%. But the sum of the emission reduction pledges submitted under the accord will fall far short of what climate scientists say is needed to avoid catastrophic climate change.
Developing countries will domestically measure and verify their actions to reduce emissions and report the information to the UN climate secretariat every two years, sidestepping the issue of independent measurement and verification, which the US strongly supported. In a reported compromise between the US and China, there will be provisions "for international consultations and analysis" under as yet undefined "clearly defined guideless that will ensure that national sovereignty is respected."
The agreement recognizes the view of most climate scientists that increases in global temperatures should be below 2 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial levels, in order to avoid severe and possibly irreversible climate change. Small island states and African countries, already experiencing or fearing the imminent impacts of climate change, proposed adoption of a target of 1.5 degree Celsius, but were blocked by the major emitting nations.
The accord makes a small nod in the direction of these most vulnerable nations by stating that by 2015 consideration should be given to strengthening the long-term goal "in relation to temperature rises of 1.5 degrees Celsius." Developed countries pledged billions of dollars to help the poorer, least developed countries adapt to climate change. The pledges helped win grudging support for the accord from most of the LDCs, who protested that the financial support pledged by the countries most responsible for the greenhouse gases currently in atmosphere is woefully inadequate.
The accord includes no time table for transforming the agreement into a legally binding agreement; no long-term (by 2050) emission reduction goals; and no specific timing for global emissions to peak and then start to decline.
Numerous questions will have to be resolved about the future of the accord in the context of the UN climate process, which operates through a tangle of subsidiary bodies, unwieldy conferences and plenaries, and has two parallel negotiating tracks - the Kyoto track for industrial counties that have ratified the treaty; and the framework convention on climate change track, which all countries, including the US, have ratified.
The Pew Center noted in its summary that the decision in Copenhagen to extend the two formal negotiating tracks "do not cross-reference the accord," and "no formal link was established."
According to an analysis by the Paris-based Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations, the status of the Copenhagen Accord "is highly uncertain from both a political and legal perspective." The final accord was reached within a small group of 30 countries (working from the proposal from the core group of five countries), "whereas the (UN framework convention) applies to 193 contracting parties."
The issue is whether the Copenhagen Accord "can help reach a consensus in both the [convention track and the Kyoto Protocol track] in the coming months on the road to Mexico," and pave the way to the adoption of a comprehensive post-2012 global regime all countries can endorse, the analysis said.
"Most importantly is whether the Copenhagen Accord can facilitate discussions in the US towards the adoption of an ambitious domestic legislation," it said.
As things now stand, the authoritative Earth Negotiations Bulletin concluded in its final report, the Copenhagen outcome "highlights that an enormous amount of work remains to be done." It remains to be seen, ENB said, "whether the political and public profile created in Copenhagen can be translated into a binding and ambitious international agreement on climate change."
