The Hindu Business Line : Case for controls on GHG emissions — Someone’s throwing garbage in your courtyard!

Two important events in the international arena in the last few months could prove to be a cornerstone in the environmental history of the world. One, the elections in Australia, where Labour was voted back in power after 12 years, with the new government signing the Kyoto Protocol, leaving the US isolated in climate politics. Additionally, the current presidential elections in the US could force both parties’ nominees to review their outlook towards the problems of environment.

The second was the consensus reached in Bali that the world needs a stronger second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol to be agreed on by 2009. It is now left to the international community to work out an agreement that will address the existing disparity between developed and developing countries and do so in a fair and equitable manner.

We must see that there is great opportunity here in driving an agreement that could redefine the industrial growth in less developed countries including India. The new agreement could actually help accelerate growth. Disparity between countries’ living standards being one of the major causes of the conflicts it would help stabilise the world politics to some extent.

It is now a scientifically proven fact that the global average increase in temperatures must be kept below 2^oC to avoid dangerous climate change. This means that the concentration of CO₂ in the atmosphere has to be limited to 450 ppm by 2050. This can be achieved only if emissions peak by 2015 and decline to about 50 per cent of 1990 levels by 2050.

The greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions could be equated to your neighbour putting all his garbage in to your courtyard. The stink does not allow you to even breathe properly. Using this analogy, the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), as defined in the Kyoto Protocol, motivates developing countries to learn to create less garbage, earning money for this, while allowing the developed countries to continue creating as much garbage that ends up in others’ courtyards.

What India should do

It is high time India takes an active part in the second phase of Kyoto negotiations to build a case for a more equitable solution, that ensures that garbage creation globally is dramatically reduced.

It does not matter who produces the “garbage” the effects are the same. The problem is further compounded by the fact that the “garbage” has been accumulating since the industrial revolution. It is a no-brainer that while there is a common responsibility for all the nations to do their bit, the developed countries both by virtue of their high per capita emissions and the fact that most of the historical emissions have come from them, have to take the lions share of the responsibility for GHG emission reductions. While this was seen as adequate in the 1990s, when the Kyoto Protocol was developed, we need a more sophisticated understanding of how the burden of climate mitigation must be shared across nations. China’s rapid growth over the last 2 decades makes it one of the biggest emitters (in absolute terms) today.

The rapid growth of India makes it clear that without the participation of the large developing countries in the new mechanism, the problem cannot be tackled. We need a global regime that is effective in tackling global warming, but is equitable too.

Science tells us that the sustainable limit for emissions is 2.5 tonnes/per capita/annum. The entire developed world is way above this average. Most of the middle-income countries, including China and Brazil, are above this limit. Ironically, thanks to a very large number of poor people India’s average per capita emission is still below the limit, while the growing rich in India are well above the world average.

If we attempted to bring every nation’s per capita emissions to 2.5 tonnes by 2050, this would imply a 90 per cent cut for the US and 80 per cent cut for the EU etc. While this would be equitable it would certainly not be the most economically efficient way of getting to the target. It would also not be conducive to growth of countries like India.

What we need therefore is a mechanism that makes the “polluters pay” for the green development of the poorer nations of the world, that is, all emissions above the sustainable per capita limit of 2.5 tonnes needs to be paid for. The current CDM is too small and woefully inadequate to bring about the level of transfer of resources (financial and technological) to do this job.

Impact of GHG

The impact of green house gas emissions is cumulative since it remains permanently in the atmosphere. The CDM is a sort of economic tool that makes it easier for developed countries to achieve their GHG reduction targets by using the lower costs of mitigation in developing countries also being an incentive for developing countries to invest in the cleaner technologies. It does not in any way put a penalty on the Annex I countries for their past emissions.

What we need therefore is:

a much bigger CDM which essentially incentivises green investments with reduced transaction costs by penalising the polluters.

a separate mechanism for financing technology development and technology transfer.

This mechanism should be based on historic emissions of developed countries on cumulative basis.

In the next two years, when the UNFCCC process would agree on the targets and processes that would constitute the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol, it is the right time for India to take a proactive role in the drafting of this agreement, simply because India will be affected most. China has already grown its emissions to a level that, in absolute terms, is comparable to those of the US.

The new mechanism should be developed with the objective of allowing growth for the less developed countries, including India and others. This is the opportune time for India to act since the additional funds created by the penalties imposed over the developed countries would pay for the development of new technologies which, in the long run, would benefit all.

The Kyoto Protocol brings into focus the callousness with which humans have polluted the earth’s atmosphere. The negative impact of this industrial growth is being felt more by the less developed countries such as India. The new CDM should focus on encouraging developing countries to develop their energy portfolios with a large proportion of renewable sources, the incremental costs of such development being paid for by the polluters.

(Shishir Tamotia is Chief Executive Officer, Ispat Energy Ltd, and G. Ananthapadmanabhan is Executive Director, Greenpeace India.)