Christmas letter from Poland

The Copenhagen Climate Summit has come and gone, not surprisingly with the failure of 192 nations to reach consensus. The New York Times today points out that this framework for trying to reach an agreement is no longer viable after 15 such assemblies and that the big nations who are the greatest contributors of CO2 will probably have to form their own binding agreement.

“The process has become unworkable, many said, because it has proved virtually impossible to forge consensus among the disparate blocs of countries fighting over environmental guilt, future costs and who should referee the results.“The climate treaty process isn’t going to die, but the real work of coordinating international efforts to reduce emissions will primarily occur elsewhere,” said Michael Levi, who has been tracking the diplomatic effort for the Council on Foreign Relations. That elsewhere will likely be a much smaller group of nations, roughly 30 countries responsible for 90 percent of global warming emissions. It was these nations that Mr. Obama rallied in a series of dramatic encounters on Friday to finally ink a deal that starts a flow of financing for poor countries to adapt to climate change and sets up a system for major economies to monitor and report their greenhouse gas emissions.

This smaller group of nations will meet periodically to tackle a narrower agenda of issues, like technology sharing or the merging of carbon trading markets, without the chaos and posturing of the United Nations process. A version of this already exists in the 17-nation Major Economies Forum, which has been a model of decorum and progress compared with what the world saw unfold at the climate talks.
The deal worked out in Copenhagen is a political agreement forged by major emitters to curb greenhouse gases, to help developing nations build clean-energy economies and to send money flowing to cushion the effects of climate change on vulnerable states. But even if countries live up to their commitments on emissions, a stark gap remains — measured in tens of billions of tons of projected flows of carbon dioxide — between nations’ combined pledges and what would be required to reliably avert the risks of disruptive changes in rainfall and drought, ecosystems and polar ice cover from global warming, scientists say”.

I have been following the excellent blog of a fellow Yorkshireman Stephen Murgatroyd now based in Alberta, Canada whom I met in Turin recently. http://themurgatroydblog.blogspot.com Stephen encouraged me to read Christopher Booker’s sceptical treatment of the issues that I mentioned in my last letter and his daily blog has offered a more balanced perspective than most mainstream journalist. He offers a perspective similar to that referred to in the NYT extract quoted above:

“So what now? As far as the UN is concerned, it is busy organizing the next summit for Mexico in December 2010. They will try again to secure an agreement on CO2 emission reductions, funds for developing nations, technology transfer and intellectual property and the verification and governance mechanisms required to enforce what they hope will be a legally binding agreement. Talks have failed, so let us have more talks is the mantra.Others, like Bjorn Lomberg, the skeptial environmentalist, are suggesting that its is time to change the fundamental focus for negotiations. Rather than focus on a global, legally binding agreement on CO2 emissions, he suggests that the focus should be on technology and mitigation efforts. Rather than live out the fantasy of “stopping climate change”, we should instead focus at the international level on dealing with the effects of climate change, while at the same time reducing emissions through national and bilateral agreements. He is not saying “don’t cut emissions”, but rather he is promoting the idea that climate change is something that has to be managed through investments in innovative technology and adaptation.This is an unpopular view, since many have bought the fantasy that action now can stop climate change. The religious belief in CO2 reduction as mankind’s only choice is now invested in so heavily, in more ways than one, that shifting the basis for the conversation is politically and economically difficult. Nonetheless, it is what it needs to happen if the world is to make progress”.

Perhaps this theme is not what one might expect in a Christmas letter but it reflects my own high priority for action in my retirement and follows in the wake of the disappointment, likely inevitable given the impossibly large assembly of nations, in Copenhagen. Global consensus, let alone governance, seems doomed to remain a pipedream of idealistic liberals. The topic is, however not unrelated to the family news with which I started this letter, nor is that family news unrelated to the festive season that is, after all, at time for celebrating a birth seen by huge numbers of humans as heralding (angels notwithstanding) hope for the future. The two awaited grandsons (whose safe deliveries would both be unlikely were we living among the ‘bottom billion’ of our fellow humans) will be 40 years old in 2050 the date of the CO2 emission targets and their parents approaching my age. So my Christmas message, in addition to “Wesolych Swiat” (Joy to the World), “Wszystkego Najlepszego” (The best of everything) and “Szczesliwego Nowego Roku” (Happy New Year), is “Let’s try to keep these possibilities for the coming generations” and also spread them to those vast numbers in 2009 whose conditions are anything but hopeful.

With thanks to all of you who took the trouble to write your own greetings or send us cards, and with apologies if I appear too sombre for this festive season – From a snowy Zwakow-Suble at minus 15 as my wife and I prepare to walk the dog at 2300 hours through our quiet deserted streets.