The Politics of Climate Change

Climate change affects everyone and everything. In El Alto, Bolivia, scientists argue that melting and disappearing glaciers are leading to water scarcity. Engineers warn that melting glaciers in South America could threaten the water supply of 30 million people. In Kenya, deforestation has caused severe floods, ruining crops and taking lives. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a group that studies climate change, estimates that about 20-30% of animal and plant species will face extinction if increases in global temperature are more than 1.5-2.5 degrees Celsius. Test your knowledge - take the climate change quiz.

Extinction of animal and plant species can disrupt the ecosystem, which could lead to food scarcity. Natural disasters due to climate change such as flooding can wipeout peoples’ source of livelihood (agriculture) and can destroy the amount of resources available. This can then lead to migration as people flee disaster-struck areas and those with limited resources. All of these consequences will change life as we know it.

Life will change more dramatically for some rather than others though. The impact of climate change will likely hit poor nations the hardest for two reasons: one, many poor, developing nations rely heavily on agriculture for their livelihoods and this type of work is the most vulnerable to climate change-related disasters. Two, many developing nations lack the resources to adapt to climate change (such as building flood-proof houses) and to help stop it (such as protecting forests). In many developing nations, where wood is needed for industry, preserving forests means cutting into their economic growth. The IPCC predicts that by 2020, in some African countries, crops requiring sufficient rain could be reduced by 50%. In addition, millions of people could be displaced due to climate impacts by 2050.

Although climate change will likely hurt some populations more than others, the bottom line is that everyone is affected by climate change. Check out the politics section below to see what nations are doing, or trying to do, to stop it.

Politics

Almost everyone now recognizes how important fighting climate change is but there is a ton of disagreement over how to do it. One of the major disagreements is between developing and developed countries.

Most scientists warn that unless countries reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the earth’s temperature will continue to rise and this will have potentially catastrophic effects on the environment. Some developed countries like the United States think developed and developing nations should commit to a legal agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions at the same time. Cutting emissions will be costly, so the U.S. and other developed nations feel it’s unfair for their economies to suffer while other nations’ economies are unharmed. However, most developed nations don’t want to agree to this right now. They feel that because developed nations polluted the earth during their industrial periods and are responsible for most of the current greenhouse gases in the atmosphere – those countries have a greater responsibility to cut emissions.

Many developing countries, which have just recently started to industrialize, also feel it’s unfair for them to have to cut their emissions when they are still developing and trying to grow their economies and increase living standards. They argue that they don’t have the economic or technical resources to commit to an agreement with specific emissions cuts. And this is exactly what Jairam Ramesh, India’s Environment Minister, said to U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton, when she urged the developing nation in July 2009 to agree to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Ramesh’s exact reply: “…we are simply not in the position to take legally binding emissions targets.”

There’s tension within countries too about how to fight climate change. Take the ongoing debate in the U.S. about a cap-and-trade system designed to cut greenhouse gas emissions. In this system, the government puts a limit or “cap” on the amount of a pollutant that can be emitted. Companies would be given a specific limit on how much they’re allowed to pollute and if they want to emit more of a pollutant then they’re allowed they’ll have to buy emissions credits from another company that has some left because it hasn’t exceeded its limit. So it’s a “trade” system because companies that haven’t used all their emission credits can trade them for money from another company that wants them.  The idea is to make pollution costly so companies will be less likely to do it.

People in the U.S that are opposed to this system are worried that it could make U.S. companies less competitive if they have to limit some of their activity due to emission limits. They’re afraid these companies may move to countries without emissions limits and therefore a lot of people in the U.S. will lose their jobs.  Supporters of the system argue that besides helping the environment, the system could lead to new job opportunities in green technology. Green technology is technology that is environmentally friendly, for example, cars that run on batteries or electricity instead of gasoline.

The Kyoto Protocol

You’ve probably heard about the Kyoto Protocol, the international agreement that was formed in Kyoto, Japan in 1997 binding industrialized (developed) nations who agree to it, to cut their greenhouse gas emissions by a certain amount by 2012. The problem with this protocol is not everyone agreed to it including the United States, which is one of the largest greenhouse gas emitters.

The reason the United States wouldn’t agree to this protocol goes back to the disagreement between developing and developed nations mentioned above. Since this protocol didn’t include specific emissions targets for developing countries to commit to, the U.S. felt it was unfair.

Many people argue that this protocol’s emission cut targets wouldn’t be enough to stop climate change anyway so even if the U.S. had agreed to it, it wouldn’t really make that much of a difference.

United Nations December 2009 Climate Change Conference

So, since the U.S. – one of the largest greenhouse gas emitters – refused to agree to the Kyoto Protocol and the first phase of that agreement will end in 2012 anyway, many are calling for a new, better agreement to fight climate change. In December 2009 leaders and delegates from nearly 200 nations met at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark to discuss this.

However, the rift between developed and developing countries continued in Copenhagen, and as a result, nations weren’t able to come up with a legally-binding agreement on how to tackle climate change.

Although a legally-binding agreement wasn’t reached, the U.S., China, India, Brazil and South Africa did create a Climate Accord, which is a non-binding document expressing their commitment to fight climate change. Though the Accord is not a legal agreement, it’s an important step in the right direction as it’s a commitment to work toward concrete action to fight climate change. For example, developed nations set a goal to raise $100 billion dollars a year by 2020 to help developing nations fight climate change. Developing nations will use these funds to support environmentally friendly actions, such as conserving their forests.

The Accord is also important because it’s a public commitment made by both a developed nation – the U.S. – and developing nations – China, India, Brazil and South Africa to work together. Fighting climate change will require a global effort, so the more developed and developing nations can come together, the better.