Monday, December 7, 2009

MEDIA RELEASE/REPORTS

 

 

Vancouver Board of Trade at UN Copenhagen climate summit

Darcy Rezac, managing director The Vancouver Board of Trade, is pleased to announce that Barry Appleton, The Vancouver Board of Trade's Washington D.C. representative, is in Copenhagen to attend the UN climate summit December 7-18, 2009 on behalf of The Board.

He will be filing reports and advising The Board of Trade on policy issues arising at the summit. Appleton, of Appleton and Associates, is a renowned international trade lawyer with offices in Washington, D.C. and Toronto. He will be speaking on the Copenhagen summit at The Board's Annual Economic Outlook Conference on January 15, 2010.

“This is an important meeting globally and I am looking forward to working with The Vancouver Board of Trade on processing the outcome, and on keeping The Board up-to-date with the latest developments on this issue," he said.

Report 1: Copenhagen, December 9, 2009

Rorschach in Copenhagen

By Barry Appleton, Vancouver Board of Trade Honorary Representative and Special Correspondent, Washington, D.C.

A group outside Copenhagen City Hall has set up a demonstration of what one ton of carbon dioxide emissions actually looks like. Photo: Barry Appleton

The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol place the onus of reducing greenhouse gas emissions on industrialized countries, as almost all these emissions in the atmosphere historically were put there by them. But in a significant departure, the Danish text asks developing countries to "commit to nationally appropriate mitigation actions, including actions supported and enabled by technology, financing and capacity-building."

Not surprisingly, every developing state worth the value of its carbon footprint has made clear that it cannot accept this proposal. The "Danish Text" has been the focus of delegate and media commentary here in Copenhagen all day long. It must not have been the best day to be a Danish climate change negotiator.

It is not clear if there was ever a serious proposal here. The "Danish text" was actually never a text put to the COP15 negotiations. It was simply an idea allegedly floated by someone in Denmark to see how it would be received. The "text" was like an inkblot in the Rorschach test. And the answer to the test is clear to all negotiators -- Danger – do not go there.

What the Danish Text has done is assess the underlying concerns of developing countries at the negotiations as well as any Rorschach test. It tells us that the developing states are sensitive to not obtaining fair rewards for making future emission cuts. This is not surprising, but it is indicative of the very problem that resulted in the U.S. government’s failure to sign the Kyoto Agreement (and helped the Canadian government to justify not implementing the Kyoto Protocol after Canada signed the treaty).

I would not put much emphasis on the meaning of a leaked Danish government position document. Instead, I put more meaning on the words of the U.S.-lead Climate Change negotiator at the talks today. He made no proposals but he made it clear that the U.S. is prepared to take these climate change talks seriously and on the basis of finding achievable emission cuts for the U.S. and for developing states, especially China.

The big question will be whether leaders are able to agree on a substantive and meaningful agreement at the end of the two week negotiations. Today, we simply had an inevitable opening salvo. The debate here will be on how to shoulder the question of reaching large amounts of greenhouse gas emission cuts. It is clear that there are large areas where there is no existing consensus on Climate Change and given the sensitivity of feelings in national delegations, it is simply too early to know how the Copenhagen process will develop. 

Report 2: Copenhagen/December 11, 2009

Blame Canada 

By Barry Appleton, Vancouver Board of Trade Honorary Representative and Special Correspondent, Washington, D.C.
 
Copenhagen/December 11, 2009: Canada continues to be the object of intense reflection at the global Climate Change talks taking place at Copenhagen. A day does not go by without a protest about the environmental effects of Canadian extraction of petroleum from the Oil Sands. Today about 60 Canadian First Nations members paraded through the talks chanting to aboriginal drums while carrying placards demanding an end to oil sands extraction.
 
These demonstrations have built on an ongoing problem caused by Canada’s failure to implement the Kyoto Protocol, despite its signature on the treaty. While most G8 countries failed to meet their Kyoto Protocol objectives, Canada alone is the only G8 country to have signed Kyoto but then entirely failed to carry out any of its provisions.
 
The reputation of Canadians in these talks has taken a serious beating. Across the conference, there has been widespread disdain for the Canadian position.  Concerns about the Canadian failure to meet its obligations has been expressed by NGO bloggers and senior conference leaders alike.  It is clear that  Canada’s previously reputation for building international institutions has been stained.
 
Canadians have often been able to feel good abroad based on their international reputation.  The Copenhagen talks mark the first time that Canadians have not been able to rely on that reputation. Indeed, in light of the Obama Administrations adoption of more climate-change friendly policies, the Canadians are now seen as the villains at the Copenhagen talks. One conference leader source stated that he simply could not understand how Canada could rehabilitate itself without a major and well-publicized volte face by Canadian Prime Minister Harper at the Copenhagen Climate Change talks next week. 

Report 3: Copenhagen/December 13. 2009

Seismic event

By Barry Appleton, Vancouver Board of Trade Honorary Representative and Special Correspondent, Washington, D.C.

Copenhagen/December 13, 2009: A seismic event has happened in the COP15 Climate Change talks – and it is based on actions by small-island nations such as Tuvalu, Palau and Grenada. Tuvalu, a small south Pacific island nation, made an aggressive proposal at the Copenhagen Talks towards high levels of climate change protection.  Speaking on behalf of the 20 member Alliance aof Small Island Nations, Tuvalu laid out an ambitious vision for a binding climate deal. It introduced a proposal to cut carbon emissions by 85 per cent by mid-century and imposing an aggressive 350 ppm (parts per million) limit to reduce what could be considered as acceptable carbon dioxide emission levels. The goal of the proposal is to reduce the two-degree Celsius target climate temperature increase recommended in 2007 by the UN Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change.

The costs for islands like Tuvalu are very real. It is a small island nation that has very real concerns for its very survival. Islands like Tuvalu have suffered a staggering loss of fisheries and the health of its coral reefs are at peril caused directly by climate change  Other islands like the Maldives are threatened to be submerged if global sea levels rise.

The position of the small island nations at the Copenhagen talks demonstrates an evolution in negotiations. It marks the first split in the power of the developing states. Styled as the G77, the developing states have wielded tremendous negotiating clout at international climate conferences on account of their impressive membership – comprising nearly one half of the 193 countries at the Conference. This time, the G77 have been joined by China – resulting in an even more powerful economic and political force.

Yet the Small Island Nations' proposal has resulted in a split in the G77. This is the first time that there has been a public split in this voting block – but perhaps the split was inevitable. The interests of the largest members of the G77, China and India, have differed from most of the other less industrialized members of the group. Industrialized developing countries have been concerned about the costs of actually obtaining emission cuts in their own countries –something that was not required of them under the lenient terms of the Kyoto Protocol. China is now the world’s largest emitter of carbon. When it is added to the G77,  the split between the two largest developing states and the others becomes pronounced and clear. The interests of “CHININDIA” are very different from the majority of the G77.

The climate change protestors and the island nation of Tuvalu want a mandatory and meaningful climate treaty. China, India and the developed states do not. So goes Tuvalu, so goes these talks.

The Tuvalu proposal is also interesting as it has relied on a technical element of the existing Kyoto Protocol to amend it instead of creating a new treaty from the Copenhagen Conference. The amendment proposal requires that a vote be held at the Cop15 talks – something in itself that is very rare at such international conferences.

Tuvalu has identified previously unseen seismic faults lurking beneath the G77 coalition. The Tuvalu proposal is much more significant than any number of protests or placards. So the quakes caused by tiny Tuvalu may well result in a virtual tsunami at these talks. Through its actions, it is threatening to cause a highly divisive vote at the climate talks that may cause China to reconsider its new-found embrace of emission reductions.

Stay tuned on this developing story.

Barry Appleton, Managing Partner
Appleton & Associates International Lawyers
Toronto ~ Washington, D.C.

Canada, Climate and Trade
Barry Appleton comments about the Waxman-Markey Bill (US Climate Bill) and its possible effects on Canada-US relations and Mr. Appleton also opines on the COP15 conference in the New York Times, Canada, Climate and Trade (28.6KB PDF)

Follow Up on Copenhagen

Still so many questions about a conference that ended with a wimper after a big Obama bang.

The final deal, now called the Copenhagen Accord, has only had 26 signatures as of the Sunday after the conference. The Copenhagen accord has no legal status.  Understanding the political messages around the talks has become very important.

A good Copenhagen outcome would have resulted in clarity of some form. This is not just important for regular citizens or for governments. The business community needs clarity in order to make the massive investments required to address a low-carbon economy. Another round of political posturing is what resulted at Copenhagen.  This did not make things better or clearer.

In my view, no one at Copenhagen was ready to have a real meeting. The governments were not ready to come to any meaningful deal.

And as a result, we are all unclear.

For example, what is the status of the current Kyoto Protocol? What will happen to countries that fail to meet their commitments under Kyoto? (Of the developed states, only the EU has a chance of making Kyto commitments.  Canada is the worst on the list – but it is in the majority of states of not being “in conformity” with the agreement.

These are all open questions. There are no clear next steps?

I, like many others, am simply not sure yet what we can take from the conference.

Barry Appleton, Managing Partner
Appleton & Associates International Lawyers
Toronto ~ Washington, D.C.

Copyright 1999-2009 The Vancouver Board of Trade. All Rights Reserved
Site Credits Privacy Policy