Mon, 07 Dec 2009 5:59p.m.
Copenhagen is about to get a lot busier
By Samantha Hayes
The Copenhagen climate change summit begins in just a few hours. Delegates from 192 countries will wrestle with ways to reduce emissions through a new agreement that will replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol.
Kyoto was hugely ambitious. It provided the first legally-binding framework for developed countries to cut their carbon emissions.
"Nothing like that had ever been attempted before," says ex-Green Party co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons.
Ms Fitzsimons was in Kyoto when the agreement was signed. She says the onus was on developed countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, because they were the ones that had caused the climate to change, according to the countries still developing.
But Ms Fitzsimons says the thinking's changed.
"Now it's clear unless the rapidly developing countries like India and China and Brazil slow their rate of emissions growth, nothing that the West does can actually be good enough to slow climate change."
China and the United States account for almost 40 percent of all emissions. The US infamously never ratified Kyoto. China did, but as a developing country, under Kyoto it wasn't legally bound to cut emissions.
"It's weakness is it did not include developing countries, where the big growth in emissions is both now and in the future," says Climate Change Minister Nick Smith.
Kyoto's goal was for developed countries to collectively reduce their emissions by 5 percent from 1990 levels before 2012, so there's still time to reach this target.
In Copenhagen the United Nations' goal is for a 25 - 40 percent reduction from 1990 levels by 2020. They say that's what the science calls for now.
But not every country has to meet that target. Under negotiation it can be spread around with some countries doing more, if some do less.
New Zealand's emissions have actually increased by 24 percent since Kyoto, but thanks to trees planted in the 1990s which are growing strongly, the increase has so far been offset.
"New Zealand is going to meet it's Kyoto targets, but that is mainly by good luck," says Mr Smith.
It is luck that will be needed if Copenhagen is to produce a deal in the next two week, and unlike Kyoto, one that both China and the US will ratify.
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