Club of Madrid Proposal for a Post-Kyoto Framework
Yesterday the Club of Madrid, the organization of 66 democratic former heads of stated, unveiled a proposal for the international climate change framework to be developed at the Conferences of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Bali this December. Glenn Hurwitz covers the proposal at Grist.
The brief summary: An international framework with a global target of 60% below 1990 levels by 2050; developed countries should be at 30% below by 2020 and rapidly developing countries should lower their energy intensity by 30% by 2020 and follow emissions targets thenceforth. A carbon price should be set by a globally linked cap-and-trade system with auctioned credits or preferably by universal carbon taxes. $20 billion should be spent annually on energy R&D and an annual fund of $50 billion should go to developing countries for adaptation, avoided deforestation, and clean energy development and deployment—the latter including renewable energy and energy efficiency. IP barriers to clean energy technologies should be dropped.
The full recommendations are past the break.
1. Bali: In addition to setting a timetable for negotiating a comprehensive post-2012 agreement, the Parties should agree in Bali on four pathways for negotiation that address mitigation, adaptation, technology, and finance. Initial draft articles should be presented to the Conference of the Parties in 2008 as a first step towards concluding a new and comprehensive agreement in 2009.
2. UNFCCC: Given the scale of response required, and in order to avoid the most adverse impacts of climate change, there should be a comprehensive post-2012 agreement under the auspices of the UNFCCC. Targeted agreements – for example, on industrial sectors, energy efficiency, renewable energy, and technology cooperation – should be encouraged and incorporated within a new comprehensive agreement.
3. Targets and timetables: All countries should commit to reduce collectively global emissions by at least 60% below the 1990 level by 2050. Developed countries should take the lead in emissions reduction by adopting effective targets and timetables. As a first step, this could include a commitment to reduce their collective emissions by 30% by 2020. Rapidly industrializing countries should commit to reduce their energy intensity by 30% by 2020 (an average of 4% per year) and agree to emissions reduction targets afterwards. Other developing countries should commit to an energy intensity target differentiated by their responsibilities and capabilities. The international community should develop a monitoring and review system and clear criteria for determining when and how various categories of countries should assume stronger climate commitments.
4. Renewable energy and energy efficiency: Long-term policies, as well as measurable and verifiable targets, should be adopted by all countries to increase substantially the use of renewable energy and to promote greater efficiency in energy production and use. In addition, global standards for end-use efficiency should be developed and adopted.
5. Avoided deforestation: To reduce the emissions of carbon dioxide cost-effectively, a full range of interventions to create and maintain biological sinks of carbon should be included in a post-2012 climate change regime in order to capture the many co-benefits of sustainable livelihoods, land management, forestry, and biodiversity conservation.
6. Carbon pricing: In order to deliver the greatest climate benefits efficiently and effectively, a carbon price should be set through carbon taxes or trading. The preferable mechanism is a system of harmonized, universal carbon taxes. For a cap-and-trade system, well functioning and financially linked carbon markets need to be developed across the globe, incorporating various national and regional cap-and-trade programs. Emissions allowances should be auctioned, thus raising resources that can be allocated by national governments for other purposes, such as clean energy development and adaptation.
7. Adaptation: A post-2012 climate agreement should address both mitigation and adaptation. Adaptation should be seen as part of sustainable development and strategies to alleviate poverty. It should include vulnerability assessments, enhancing resilience to climate impacts, access to information and best practices, building human and institutional capacity, and making public and private investments in developing countries less susceptible to climate change. A substantial package of financial support, including public and private funds, should be established (see Recommendation 11). Centers for Adaptation in Agriculture should be established, particularly by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research in Africa.
8. Energy R&D: Recent declines in investments for energy research and development should be reversed. Research, development and demonstration of more efficient and less costly energy technologies, such as advanced solar thermal technologies, as well as carbon capture and storage, should be a high priority. Aggregate public expenditures should be increased to US$20 billion per year.
9. Clean energy deployment: In order to tackle climate change at the requisite scale, clean energy technologies should be made available and utilized by all countries. All developing countries, especially rapidly industrializing countries, should have access to clean energy technologies on preferential terms. The barriers that hamper the dissemination of such technologies in developing countries, such as intellectual property rights and competitive rules, should be overcome. In order to encourage collaboration on a “clean technology revolution,” the formation of a “Consultative Group on Clean Energy Research” should be considered as part of a global climate agreement. Innovation targets to bring new technologies to market, as well as incentives for meeting them, should also be considered.
10. Sustainable development financing: The Clean Development Mechanism should be reformed in order to deliver its full potential during the 2008-2012 commitment period, and in the post-2012 regime an additional market mechanism should support sectoral approaches capable of transforming whole sectors of rapidly industrializing countries at a speed commensurate with the challenge of taking emissions reductions to global scale.
11. Funding: Finance is a critical element of any strategy to address climate change effectively. A climate fund of additional resources, starting at US$10 billion and growing to US$50 billion per year, should be established to support climate change activities in developing countries (adaptation, avoided deforestation, and clean energy development and deployment) and should include both public and private resources. It should have an innovative structure and governance that is transparent and inclusive. In addition, existing mechanisms, such as the Global Environment Facility and the Multilateral Development Banks, should be strengthened and their resources enhanced to continue their important work in demonstrating new approaches, building human and institutional capacity, and leveraging private finance.
Carbon Markets USA 1
San Francisco, 11-12 September 2007
As the GHG market transitions from voluntary trading to compliance with state (and surely soon federal) requirements, projections are that the annual global volumes of GHG credits will increase from $21.6m (2006) to reach $60 billion and may eventually top $1 trillion.
This unique meeting will bring together the leading US and International experts together for two days of intense, information rich presentations, debates and networking. Understand how one of the World’s largest future commodity markets will develop and impact upon your business.
Speakers- Commissioner Jeffrey Byron, California Energy Commission
- Terry Tamminen, Energy & Environmental Advisor to Governor Schwarzenegger
- Allen Alley, Deputy Chief of Staff, Governor’s Office, State of Oregon
- Richard Saines, Partner, Baker & McKenzie, USA
- Veronique Bugnion, Managing Director, Point Carbon, USA
- David N. Reschke, Noble Carbon Credits, Canada
- Ian Carter, Policy Coordinator, North America, International Emissions Trading Association IETA, Canada
- Thomas D. Peterson, Executive Director, The Center for Climate Strategies, USA
- Angus Duncan, Oregon Carbon Allocation Task Force, USA
- Doug Scott, Chair, Illinois Climate Change Advisory Group, USA
- Josh Bushinsky, Western Policy Coordinator, Pew Center on Global Climate Change, USA
- Gia Schneider, Vice President, Credit Suisse, USA
- Imtiaz Ahmad, VP, Morgan Stanley, UK
- Blake Schaefer, Director, Global Environmental Finance, Stark Investments
- Roger Williams, VP – Portfolio Development, Blue Source
- Marc Stuart, Co-founder, Director of New Business Development, EcoSecurities
- Barbara McKee, Director CSLF, Chair IEA Working Party on Fossil Fuels & Director of Clean Energy Collaboration, DOE, USA
- George Peridas, Science Fellow, Climate Center, Natural Resources Defense Council
- Arthur Lee, CSLF Stakeholder; Principal Advisor, Global Policy & Strategy, Chevron, U.S.A
- Len Eddy, Managing Director, Agcert International, Canada
- David B. Layzell, President and CEO, BIOCAP Canada Foundation, Canada
- Richard A. Birdsey, Program Manager, Global Change Research, USDA Forest Service
- Doug Wikizer, Chief Environmental Protection and Regulations, California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, USA
- Lisa Jacobson, Executive Director, Business Council for Sustainable Energy, USA
- Nathan Clark, Director, Offset Projects/Economist, Chicago Climate Exchange, USA
- Ricardo Bayon, Director, The Ecosystem Marketplace
- Cameron Brooks, VP – Resource Development, Renewable Choice Energy
- Mike Bess, General Manager North America, Europe and Africa, Camco International, UK
- Meg Gottstein, Administrative Law Judge, California Public Utilities Commission
- Ned Helme, President, CCAP, Center for Clean Air Policy, USA
- Frank T. Princiotta, Director of the Air Pollution Prevention and Control Division, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, USA
APEC Climate Agreement
According to the Associated Press, the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit set a voluntary target of reducing energy intensity (the ratio of energy consumption per unit of GDP) 25 percent by 2030. In addition, Australia and Russia announced an agreement on a “long-term global aspirational goal for stabilising and then reducing greenhouse gas emissions” and to “allow the supply of Australian uranium for use in Russia’s civil nuclear power industry.”
As the BBC explains, the reductions in energy intensity would not lead to any reduction in GHG emissions. In fact, a 49% reduction in energy intensity by 2050, given projected economic growth, translates to a rise in greenhouse gas emissions of about 15%.
Andrew Dessler has more at Gristmill on what he calls the “intensity scam.”
Coverage of Coal Hearing
Grist’s Brian Beutler covers yesterday’s Global Warming Committee hearing on The Future of Coal Under Cap and Trade:
Here are two takes on the issue, from two sources that couldn’t be more deeply at odds with each other. Both suggest coal may yet see its heyday.The first comes from Michael Morris, CEO of American Electric Power, who testified at the hearing. He supports, in the same tepid way that many energy companies now do, an economy-wide cap-and-trade program with carbon credits allocated freely. (His justification for this might just represent one of the great moments in the history of inadvertent honesty: “We believe that credits ought to be allocated to those who will invest the capital to make a difference in the environment, rather than an auction so that those who buy them can make money by the positions they have taken.” In other words, give energy companies the allocations because we’re already rich and don’t award the innovators for beating us to the punch.) One of Moore’s other main points was that coal companies won’t begin installing CCS equipment until CCS “has been demonstrated to be effective, and the costs have significantly dropped so that it becomes commercially available on a widespread basis.”
He’s certainly not the only person who thinks it’s politically infeasible to impose drastic, costly policies on the coal industry—and that therefore carbon-based energy companies have the world by the political balls. Robert Sussman, an environmental expert testifying on behalf of the Center for American Progress, said, “unfortunately, our analysis indicates that the initial stages of cap-and-trade programs [do not] not make carbon prices high enough to eliminate cost differentials” between clean and dirty coal plants.
That points toward two possibilities: We could ratchet up the regulatory impact of climate-change legislation, or we could subsidize the hell out of CCS.
At the end of the hearing, Sussman suggested that the Congress set a date (specifically the year 2016) by which CCS technology be standardized, saying the cost of such a hasty transition would require $35 billion to $40 billion in research subsidies.
As a consolation prize, David Hawkins, director of the Climate Center at NRDC, proposed that the marginal costs of outfitting coal plants with CCS technology should be paid directly by consumers (a green incentive) and not by direct tax subsidies. Woot?
APEC
The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit is this weekend in Sydney, Australia, and President Bush will be there. APEC includes 21 countries surrounding the Pacific Ocean, including the US, Australia, China, Mexico, and Japan. A primary topic of discussion will be climate change, which the administration is highlighting.
On September 4, Bush and Prime Minister Howard released a joint announcement on climate change that “agreed today on the importance of confronting the interlinked challenges of climate change, energy security and clean development” and the goal of achieving an international agreement in Bali that “provides for effective action from all the major emitting nations toward the UNFCCC objective of stabilizing greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system”. The upcoming APEC statement on climate change and the outcome of the Major Economies Meeting on Energy Security and Climate Change in Washington DC on Spetember 27-28 will indicate the US negotiating position for the UN conference.
What specifics are in the agreement?- Fighting deforestation (i.e. getting credit under international agreements for forests, Australia’s Global Intitiative on Forests and Climate)
- Increasing free trade
- Expanded nuclear power (Generation IV International Forum and Global Nuclear Energy Partnership)
- reduced pollution technology investment (Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate)
- Coal gasification (the FutureGen International Partnership)
- Other multilateral partnerships (the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum, the Methane to Markets Partnership, the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Partnership, and the International Partnership for the Hydrogen Economy)
On the White House website EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson will be taking questions on Friday, September 7 at 12:45 pm EDT.
AVAAZ has a international petition calling for action on global warming at the APEC summit with over 400,000 co-signers.
The U.S. is working closely with Australia and other APEC countries to address broadly the challenges posed by climate change. Among the topics for discussion will be energy efficiency, forestry, technology development, alternative energy, low-carbon energy, and importantly, continuing efforts to reduce barriers to trade in environmental goods and services.
In response to a question, Price indicated that climate change will be an issue in the bilateral discussions for many of the countries, not just Australia.
And the President has made it very clear, both in Heilingendamm during the G8 meetings, that the problem of climate cannot be responsibly addressed unless all of the major economies are at the table, including those represented by the developing world. And nine of those are APEC members. So working cooperatively with our APEC partners, as we’ve begun to do under the Asian Pacific Partnership, and carrying that plan forward through the bilateral leader meetings and through the summit discussions is very high on the agenda.Jim Connaughton, Chairman of the Council of Environmental Quality, had this to say:
As you know, we had the big breakthrough in Heilingendamm this year, right after the President’s speech on May 31st, and that’s with sort of the G8 grouping. At that time we had the plus-5, but they were not part of the leaders declaration on this. This is our chance in the APEC region, which represents these 21 nations, and a good combination of developing and highly-developed nations, to really set the foundation in that region for a shared understanding on a way forward on the energy security and climate issues.So we’ll take what occurred in Europe and now try to advance that in terms of toward common consensus in Asia. We’ve been very encouraged because a lot of the thinking behind the President’s proposal in May was a result—you asked about Asia and how much time we’re spending there. Well, I’ve spent a ton of time in Asia, talking with the leadership in China, Japan, South Korea. I was just in Indonesia. So there’s a lot of interest in the Asia Pacific region taking on more of a proactive role in this area.
And I think you’ll see that with Prime Minister Howard. He put this on the agenda for the first time in APEC since it was formed. So that’s a big shift. And we’re hearing from Indonesia, China, South Korea, these countries that didn’t have obligations before—you’re hearing some very positive statements from their leadership on the importance of this integrated agenda on energy and clean air and climate. And that’s because the region is growing so fast, too. They’re struggling with these environmental challenges in a more consequential way now. And that, I think, paves the way for more constructive conversation.
Sen. Reid Calls for Global Coal Plant Moratorium
Sen. Reid, Senate Majority Leader from Nevada, detailed his position on America’s energy and global warming policy. He called for a moratorium on coal-fired plants and a restructuring of tax policy away from gas and oil and toward renewable energy.
At a community meeting he said:
Let us spend a few billion developing what we have a lot of. We have a lot of sun, we have a lot of wind and we are the Saudi Arabia of geothermal energy. The sooner we move toward the sun, the wind, geothermal, biomass, the better off we’ll be, and we will never do it until we have a tax policy that gives people an incentive to invest in these industries because the big oil companies have controlled America.
More at Grist, It’s Getting Hot in Here, and I Think Mining.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said the threat of global warming should preclude the construction of new coal-fired power plants anywhere in the world.The Nevada Democrat last month came out against three proposed major coal-fired plants in his home state, but on Saturday extended that opposition to any such new plants worldwide.
He said each coal-fired plant burns 7 million tons of coal every year, spewing out pollutants that contribute to global warming.
“There’s not a coal-fired plant in America that’s clean. They’re all dirty,” Reid told reporters after speaking at a conference on renewable energy. “Unless we do something quickly about global warming, we’re in trouble.”
The enemy is conventional thinking
Thomas Casten addresses the potential gains in carbon reduction by focusing on the energy distribution systems:
I’ve done a study of what would happen if the United States went all the way with power recycling. We could cut our electric fuel in half. We could drop CO2 by between 20 and 30 percent. And we could make money on the first 25 percent drop with today’s technology. In the process, the technology would improve and we would be able to go farther.And the consequences of ignoring this sector:
In 1900, about 3.5 percent of the potential energy put into electric generation actually became delivered electricity, and about 1.5 percent of it ended up as useful work. The curve rises for the next 60 years, as these things get more efficient. By 1960, about 32.5 percent of the potential was arriving as electricity. In 2005, we’re at 33 percent. The electrical generation industry stopped improving its efficiency.
Natasha Chart addresses the question of agricultural practices and soil carbon content:
The Carbon Farmers of America assert that, “[i]f the American people were to restore the soil fertility of the Great Plains that we have destroyed in the last 150 years, atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide would be reduced to near pre-industrial levels.”
Both approaches offer massive opportunity for everyone from corporations to families.
They conclude, respectively, “The enemy is conventional thinking,” and “Answers could be right under our feet.”
Los Angeles Global Warming Forum: Local Challenges and Opportunities
The 2007 Los Angeles Global Warming Forum will take place Thursday, August 16th at Cal State LA from 9:00am – 3:00pm.
Participants at the forum, which is being organized in collaboration with California State University, Los Angeles, will discuss the impacts of global warming on local resources, highlight local and regional initiatives to mitigate impacts, and discuss economic opportunities associated with taking action to improve energy efficiency. Also, exhibitors will display new energy efficiency strategies and new technologies at an expo.
On August 2nd, the House passed The Green Jobs Act of 2007, legislation introduced by Solis to invest in work force training for the green economy. The bill was passed as part of the House Democratic leadership’s energy reform bill – H.R. 3221, the New Direction for Energy Independence, National Security, and Consumer Protection Act.
Cal State University, Los Angeles Golden Eagle Ballroom (3rd floor) 5151 State University Drive, Los Angeles, CA 90032
- Congresswoman Hilda L. Solis (CA-32), member of the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming
- Former Assemblywoman Fran Pavley
- Mayor of Long Beach, Bob Foster
- Van Jones, director of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights
Shareholders Pressure Exxon on Global Warming
The ring tone on Sister Patricia Daly’s cellphone is the “Hallelujah” chorus from Handel’s “Messiah,” which makes every call sound as if it’s coming from God. On the particular May afternoon, however, David Henry, who handles investor relations for the ExxonMobil Corporation, was on the line. Henry wanted to know if Daly planned to attend the annual shareholder meeting later that month — a rhetorical question, really, since Daly had been at every one of them for the past 10 years. At each she posed roughly the same question: What is ExxonMobil, the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, planning to do about global warming?
The article makes reference to Citigroup’s influential climate change investment report from the beginning of the year, Climatic Consequences: Investment Implications of a Changing Climate, and the May 2007 Greenpeace report ExxonMobil’s Continued Funding of Global Warming Denial Industry.
Yet global warming does seem to be an area in which social and fiscal concerns overlap. Recent reports by Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Lehman Brothers have reinforced the notion that climate change has the potential to affect a company’s bottom line, and shareholder resolutions have been remarkably effective at getting companies to take global warming seriously. After the Connecticut state treasurer’s office filed three consecutive climate resolutions with American Electric Power, the nation’s single-largest producer of carbon dioxide, the company agreed in 2004 to study the impact on its operations of various carbon cap-and-trade proposals, whereby companies must either limit their carbon emissions or purchase emissions credits from other companies that pollute less. Today American Electric is one of the companies calling for mandatory carbon constraints. Other companies singled out by shareholder activists, like Home Depot, Ford, Prudential, Cinergy, Chevron Texaco, Apache and ConocoPhillips, have variously agreed to disclose their greenhouse-gas emissions, study the impact of climate change on their businesses, invest in renewable energy sources or support a mandatory carbon cap.The exception, as Daly notes, is ExxonMobil. For years the company denied that global climate change was occurring. According to a Greenpeace report in May, ExxonMobil funnels more than $2 million a year to groups that dispute the reality of global warming. The company’s current C.E.O., Rex Tillerson, made headlines in February when he admitted that the risks from climate change “could prove to be significant,” but he continues to emphasize the uncertainty of the science. In May he said: “I know people like to boil it down to something very simple — the polar ice caps are melting, the planet is seven-tenths of a degree centigrade warmer. It’s really not that simple of an equation.” And while BP, Shell and ConocoPhillips have joined the United States Climate Action Partnership, which is lobbying for mandatory carbon limits, and are investing in renewable energy sources like wind, solar and biofuels, ExxonMobil remains coy about which, if any, carbon constraints it would support and has stated unequivocally that the company will not be putting money into renewables.