"The truth, however, is that Kyoto, as a means to reduce carbon emissions, has been like Monty Python's parrot, long dead, despite all the protestations to the contrary by its salesmen."
Dominic Lawson, columnist for the British newspaper "The Independent," issued a scathing condemnation of the Poznan Climate Talks aimed at renewing the Kyoto Protocol after 2012:
The truth, however, is that Kyoto, as a means to reduce carbon emissions, has been like Monty Python's parrot, long dead, despite all the protestations to the contrary by its salesmen.
You don't have to be a "climate change sceptic" to assert this unwelcome fact. Professor Gwyn Prins, Director of the LSE's Mackinder Centre for the Study of Long Wave Events, has been advocating measures to reduce what he sees as man-made climate change since 1986. He was a lead author on the Third and Fourth Assessment Reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and on the Advisory Board of Friends of the Earth UK. For some years now, Prof Prins has been warning that the Kyoto approach is hopelessly flawed - and his unpopularity in the environment ministries of Europe has grown, precisely as his criticisms of their approach have been vindicated.
Lawson then quotes Prins' "The Wrong Trousers," (pdf) explaining the futility of creating a top-down market for carbon that is predicated on an "over confident assertion of fragile knowledge." Lawson comments:
This fabricated market in carbon has at its heart the UN's Clean Development Mechanism. This is how the EU, which had an obligation under Kyoto to reduce its emissions by two per cent by 2012, has managed to claim success while actually increasing its emissions by 13 per cent. By purchasing so called "offsets" from countries such as China, Britain, for example, proclaims itself a "leader in the fight against climate change.
While the numbers Lawson sites contradict reports that emissions have risen by 12 percent in Europe if one discounts Britain and Germany, the spirit of the point is the same: simply put, offsets are dubious. He continues by citing the economic drivers undermining any attempt at a carbon permit auction:
Now that the EU is attempting at Poznan to set up a scheme which will make its industries buy carbon allocations via an auction, rather than simply receiving them free of charge, reality is finally intruding on the madness. Angela Merkel, as environment minister in Helmut Kohl's administration, was noted for her promotion of policies solely designed to reduce Germany's carbon emissions. As Chancellor, however, she has become better acquainted with the arguments of her country's industrial base. Thus last week in Berlin Merkel declared: "We must ensure that our energy-intensive industry, which is driven by exports, is of course excluded from the emissions quotas. We cannot stand by while jobs in the chemicals, steel and other industries move to regions of the world where climate protection is less stringent than here."
And finally, Lawson concludes with the geopolitical situation that would force countries in Eastern Europe to act against their own national security interests to reduce carbon emissions:
As for the host nation Poland, it produces 94 per cent of its energy from its own supplies of coal - the devil's fuel, according to the Kyoto process. Other European countries have, in effect, attempted to bribe the Poles to agree to take Russian gas instead of using their own coal to keep the country going. If they understood anything about the history of Poland, they would surely realise that there is not a chance that the Poles would voluntarily make themselves reliant on Russia to keep the lights on. I wonder if the hosts might suddenly arrange to have the delegates' hotel heating turned off in freezing Poznan, just to get the point across.
Lawson's voice is just one of many that have denounced carbon pricing systems this month, coinciding with the talks in Poland. As the ETS faces potential collapse and Europe plans to break ground on new coal plants, it is increasingly more important to articulate an investment agenda for a transition to a global clean energy system. Keep your eyes open for Breakthrough's upcoming special issue on how to spur energy innovation in the Obama administration.
