Why I’m Optimistic
A reflection on the events of COP20 and a personal opinion on the state of action against global climate change
The Lima Climate Change Conference (COP20) drew to an end last night with the publishing of their agreement at around 2AM, and this morning the internet is buzzing in response. Bloggers, journalists, twitter users, and just people with opinions are all giving their feedback on how the negotiators at COP20 did and, for the most part, they’re not happy. They’re throwing around words and phrases like “crucially failed” or “shameful compromise” and even the environmental minister of Peru says that “as a text, it’s not perfect.” They claim it isn’t strict enough and it won’t accomplish anything.
Yet somehow amidst all of these negative feelings, I feel pretty optimistic.
Maybe I’m too young and naïve and haven’t followed this type of political event enough to be jaded and cynical; but I’m optimistic. Sure, the world isn’t magically saved with the publishing of this agreement, but I truly believe that the COP20 has made certain gains that will pave a very nice pathway for further agreements and progress to be made.
A (Very) Brief History of International Negotiations
Let’s look at the Montreal Protocol, for example. In 1987, the international community came together in Montreal to determine what it was going to do about chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) to minimize the effects of stratospheric ozone depletion. The Montreal Protocol is widely regarded as the most successful environmental treaty in history, yet it alone would not have actually had that significant of effects on ozone depletion.
As seen in the figure to the left (in which low ozone depletion correlates with low predicted abundance of stratospheric chlorine), the zero emissions target is only really reached with the subsequent tightening of the Montreal Protocol by the London, Copenhagen, and Beijing Protocols. With each subsequent agreement, the policies got stricter and the goal got nearer.
And don’t get me wrong — by no means am I equating COP20 with the Montreal Protocol. However, COP20 was an agreement. And with COP20's main goal as getting an agreement of what will be a part of the global pact written at COP21 in Paris, I think that gives a lot of room for a Montreal-like success story here in Lima. Even with an arguably weak base, it still gives a base for Paris to further refine.
Reduction Pledges
Another area in which many are claiming that COP20 failed is that the agreement doesn’t give specific targets to specific countries, and instead just encourages individual parties to set their own limits and provides a format for these pledges. These pledges need to be drafted by March or June of 2015, depending on development status, and will undergo an assessment (similar to the multilateral assessment I imagine), and be discussed at length at COP21. These pledges are self-determined and must only be done by “those parties ready to do so.” And while even I will admit that this is — pardon my colloquialism — kind of lame, a reduction pledge at its base is still a reduction pledge.
If even just the “ready to do so” countries — like the US and China, for example — make pledges, that would still mean that a huge number of countries are making efforts against climate change. Even reductions that will not even be noticeable in the long term set the stage for further reductions and stronger policies in the future. Setting up the framework for this pledging systems puts power in the hands of countries to set up their own goals and policies while still allowing international negotiations to later strengthen them.
Looking Forward
While doing a lot of reading on the outcomes of this conference, I stumbled upon a quote that I think ties this all together very well:
“There is no Paris without Lima.”
It’s completely true. Without the hours of negotiation, the back-and-forth arguments, and the perhaps weak conclusion, there would be no agreed upon basis for a much stronger global pact to be made next year in Paris. The Lima negotiators set themselves up for some hard discussions in Paris, but also some much stronger legislation and policies to be made.
I know I’ll definitely be tuning in to watch and follow Paris with a steadfast feeling of optimism, and hopefully the rest of the world will be optimistic with me.
