Klimakonferansen ender med full seir til bushismen-reaganismen-Alan
Greenspans tenkning. Kyoto er død og begravd, og klimaspørsmålet er i ferd
med å lide samme skjebne i mediene som debatten om alternative økonomiske
teorier i den økonomiske "vitenskapen". De forsvinner.
Det må bli adskillig mye verre enn nå før det - kanskje - vil begynne å
skje noe.
Kanskje må man en dag begynne å overveie hvordan man skal løse
vannforsyningen i Norge når det er samtidig skogbrannfare i Nord-Norge og
ekstrem flomkatastrofe i Sør, slik som tilfellet er nå. Og neste år motsatt.
Hornindalsvatnet står nå 70 cm under normal vannstand, og brønner er tørre
på Grotli.
Foreløpig er det the pyttpytt blues som rår.
Karsten Johansen
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1038000/1038534.stm
Friday, 24 November, 2000, 13:12 GMT
Climate talks under threat
There is a real threat of a talks collapse in the Hague
By BBC News Online's
environment correspondent Alex Kirby in The Hague
A last-minute attempt to save the climate conference here from ignominious
collapse has itself run into trouble.
It rests on a compromise paper put forward by the conference president, Jan
Pronk, the Dutch Environment Minister.
But some delegates say its effect would be to halve the cuts in greenhouse
gases the developed nations are committed to make.
They say the talks are running out of time to reach an agreement.
French environment minister Dominique Voynet told journalists that some
countries "don't want the protocol ratified and we have to ensure that this
strategy fails".
The conference aims to finalise the workings of the international climate
treaty, the Kyoto Protocol, so that it can be ratified and enter into force.
Under it, industrialised countries have promised to cut their emissions of
carbon dioxide (CO2) and five other greenhouse gases to 5.2% below their
1990 levels, with different countries having different targets.
But several European Union delegations believe that, if Mr Pronk's paper is
accepted as it stands, it would cut that figure of 5.2% to 2.2%.
Carbon sinks
This, they say, is because it would allow much wider use than they think is
justified of "carbon sinks" - forests and farmland which can mop up CO2 for
a time, and which countries could then claim meant they had achieved their
reduction targets without actually cutting emissions at all.
An EU source told BBC News Online: "We don't want as much use of forests as
this.
"The Pronk paper opens the question up far more widely than we'd like,
because the science isn't there to back up this sort of use."
"Anyway, there's no need to do it - it's just exploiting a loophole."
The EU is also understood to be deeply unhappy about a passage in Mr Pronk's
paper, which is now the focus of high-level negotiation, which says that
countries "shall meet their emission commitments primarily through domestic
action".
"That word 'primarily' is too vague", said the source.
"How do you measure it?"
"And the Kyoto Protocol says that paying for emission reductions in other
countries to count against your own emissions shall be supplemental to
domestic action."
"That does not square with 'primarily' ," the source added.
Final hours
Beyond these detailed criticisms of the paper, there is concern that the
conference is in danger of losing its way in these final hours.
"The process is falling apart", one delegate told BBC News Online.
"When Jan Pronk introduced his paper to the midnight plenary session, he
tried to distance himself from it.
"He's wasted a lot of time in the last two days, and now it looks as if
there's just too much to do.
" No-one has a clear map to a successful conclusion."
Mr Pronk told journalists he believed his paper was "balanced".
"We don't think it's balanced", said the EU source.
"It's biased against us. It fails to do what for us is crucial, and that's
to protect the environmental integrity of the protocol."
Serious reservations
It is inevitable with any compromise that everyone will be unhappy with it,
and other delegations, including the US and Japan, have serious reservations
about the paper.
Mr Pronk himself acknowledged that his proposal would cause "pain".
And international negotiations of this sort often run up to and beyond their
deadlines, until sheer exhaustion wrings acceptance from the participants of
the least bad option on offer.
All the same, the chances of a successful outcome here remain in the balance.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Jan 18 2001 - 10:59:25 MET