Earth Day Celebration: Global Warming Treaty Will Be Signed Today
Today is Earth Day. This celebration has been going annually on since 1970.
The first Earth Day was originally celebrated on March 21, 1970 in San Francisco. It was the brainchild of John McConnell, a peace activist and ecologist. But then the United Nations picked up the idea. The UN changed Earth Day in 1971 to the vernal equinox. The UN defined this as April 22.
Earth Day has become an international phenomenon. It has replaced May Day on the calendar of environmentalists around the world. I guess we can be thankful for small blessings. Since they no longer celebrate May Day in Russia with a military parade, about the only thing left for "May day" is a cry for help. Even the public school May poles of my youth are only a fading memory.
Back in 1971, there was great fear about a looming ice age. James Hansen, a scientist with NASA, had developed a computer program that he claimed could forecast long-term climate change. His program was used by a colleague, who discovered the looming ice age. The Washington Post ran this chilling July 9 headline: U.S. Scientist Sees New Ice Age Coming. Hansen did not object to this finding. The idea spread. This 1977 book told the story.
That was then. This is now.
THE PARIS AGREEMENT
On April 20, 2016, this appeared in paragraph 2 of the Wikipedia entry for "Earth Day":
On Earth Day 2016, the landmark Paris Agreement is scheduled to be signed by the United States, China, and some 120 other countries. This signing satisfies a key requirement for the entry into force of the historic draft climate protection treaty adopted by consensus of the 195 nations present at the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris.
Today's the day!
What is the "landmark Paris Agreement"? What kind of mark constitutes a landmark?
Inquiring minds want to know!
There is a treaty. What will the treaty bind its signers to?
Inquiring minds want to know!
So, I went to the Wikipedia entry for "Paris Agreement". Here, I learned many things.
The Paris Agreement (French: L'accord de Paris) is an agreement within the framework of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) dealing with greenhouse gases emissions mitigation, adaptation and finance starting in the year 2020. An agreement on the language of the draft treaty was negotiated by representatives of 195 countries at the 21st Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC in Paris and adopted by consensus on 12 December 2015, but has not entered into force.
The key word is "finance." Follow the money.
The head of the Paris Conference, France's foreign minister Laurent Fabius, said this "ambitious and balanced" plan is a "historic turning point" in the goal of reducing global warming.
Mr. Fabius is exactly the right person to announce this, for the Paris Agreement is the latest program in what has been called Fabian economics for over a century.
Let us continue. We learn this: "The aim of the convention is described in Article 2, 'enhancing the implementation' of the UNFCCC."
"(a) Holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels, recognizing that this would significantly reduce the risks and impacts of climate change;(b) Increasing the ability to adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change and foster climate resilience and low greenhouse gas emissions development, in a manner that does not threaten food production;
(c) Making finance flows consistent with a pathway towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient development."
Again, pay attention to the phrase "finance flows." Finance will indeed flow: from the private sector to the government sector. But this raises a question: "Which government or governments?" This has yet to be worked out.
We then are treated to a new word: stocktake.
Global stocktakeThe implementation of the agreement by all member countries together will be evaluated every 5 years, with the first evaluation in 2023. The outcome is to be used as input for new nationally determined contributions of member states. The stocktake will not be of contributions/achievements of individual countries but a collective analysis of what has been achieved and what more needs to be done.
Stocktake is a noun. But never forget this rule of grammar: "Every noun can be verbed." Is stocktake going to be verbed? Is it going to become stocktaking? You bet it is! That is what the evaluations will be all about. The stocktaking reports will continue in five-year intervals. Call it a five-year plan.
Meanwhile. . . .
At the conclusion of COP 21, on 12 December 2015, the final wording of the Paris Agreement was adopted by consensus by all of the 195 UNFCCC participating member states and the European Union to reduce emissions as part of the method for reducing greenhouse gas. In the 12 page Agreement, the members promised to reduce their carbon output "as soon as possible" and to do their best to keep global warming "to well below 2 degrees C" [3.6 degrees F]. Not part of the Paris agreement (and not legally binding) the agreement indicates a (non-binding) plan to provide $100 billion a year in aid to developing countries for implementing new procedures to minimize climate change with additional amounts to be provided in subsequent years.
One hundred billion dollars a year is a nice round number. This is what is euphemistically called "finance flows."
From whom to whom? This has not yet been worked out.
The transfer has begun:
In early March 2016, the Obama administration gave a $500 million grant to the "Green Climate Fund" as the first chunk of a $3bn commitment made at the Paris climate talks."
That is what I would call a nice chunk of cash -- yours and mine no longer.
OR ELSE
But, as with all good things, there is a catch.
The Paris Agreement will open for signature by States and regional economic integration organizations that are Parties to the UNFCCC (the Convention) from 22 April 2016 to 21 April 2017 at the UN Headquarters in New York. It will enter into force (and thus become fully effective) only if 55 countries that produce at least 55% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions ratify, accept, approve or accede to the agreement.
Treaties must always be accompanied by an implicit addendum: "or else."
In the case of the Paris Agreement, "or else what?"
Although the agreement was lauded by many, including French President Francois Hollande and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, criticism has also surfaced. For example, Professor James Hansen, a former NASA scientist and a climate change expert, voiced anger about the fact that most of the agreement consists of "promises" or aims and not firm commitments.
What's that? James "Ice Age" Hansen is angry? Well, can we blame him? The world ignored his warning in 1971. It did nothing. So, he revised his forecast. He substituted global warming for global cooling. Now the world is doing nothing again. This is ingratitude on an international scale.
He is not alone.
Institutional asset owners associations and think-tanks such as the World Pensions Council (WPC) have also observed that the stated objectives of the Paris Agreement are implicitly "predicated upon an assumption -- that member states of the United Nations, including high polluters such as China, the US, India, Brazil, Canada, Russia, Indonesia and Australia, which generate more than half the world's greenhouse gas emissions, will somehow drive down their carbon pollution voluntarily and assiduously without any binding enforcement mechanism to measure and control CO2 emissions at any level from factory to state, and without any specific penalty gradation or fiscal pressure (for example a carbon tax) to discourage bad behaviour. A shining example of what Roman lawyers called circular logic: an agreement (or argument) presupposing in advance what it wants to achieve."
But never fear. Al gore is here.
Al Gore stated that "no agreement is perfect, and this one must be strengthened over time, but groups across every sector of society will now begin to reduce dangerous carbon pollution through the framework of this agreement."
So, all that is lacking is "or else." Also, "enforced by whom?"
Meanwhile, politicians without mandates from their legislatures will sign the treaty today.
And a good time will be had by all . . . except for James Hansen, who will remain angry.
[Note: just in case the Wikipedia entry gets revised, here is the original as of April 20, 2016: