COP-6 Off to Shaky Start
The sixth Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change got off to a shaky start this week. This is supposed to be the concluding conference to finalize the Kyoto Protocol, but there appears to be little movement on the major issues that have plagued the negotiations from the beginning.
According to a Reuters story (November 15, 2000), the disagreement between the European Union and the United States over the use of emissions trading is as sharp as ever. “So far, I havent seen anyone move their position by one centimeter,” said Raul Estrada, Argentinas special representative for the environment. The EU believes that the developed countries should reduce emissions through “tough domestic policies.”
Indeed, the EU probably wont budge from its negotiating stance. Its 15 nations agreed to form a “united front in demanding tough rules for compliance,” that would “ensure countries made most of their emissions cuts through domestic action rather than through emissions credits or other flexible mechanisms,” according to a November 8 Reuters story. The EU also agreed to demand firm sanctions against countries which miss their targets and strict limits on the use of so-called carbon sinks uses of forests, which absorb carbon to account for some of a countrys target.
The U.S. and its allies, Canada, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand, want full emissions trading that would allow them to purchase credits from developing countries and Russia as part of their compliance strategy. Adding to the standoff is a deal struck between the U.S. and fourteen Latin American countries “to push for full-scale trading in greenhouse gas emissions as a solution to global warming.” The emission credits would be created through U.S. funding of rainforest preservation in Latin America (Financial Times, November 6, 2000).
The “G-77 plus China” Group are also trying to present a united front in the negotiations. But their coalition is fracturing due to several disagreements. In general, the group wants the industrialized nations to commit to tough emissions reduction targets. But small island states worried about rising sea levels, for instance, have little in common with oil producing countries in the Middle East.
Saudi Arabia claims that it would lose $25 billion per year as a result of Kyoto and wants to be compensated. “There will be no outcome if our concerns are not adequately addressed,” warned Mohammed al-Sabban, head of the Saudi delegation.
IPCC Peer Review Process a Sham
Controversy continues to surround the leaked draft of the Summary for Policymakers of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changes Third Assessment Report (TAR). New charges resemble the complaints made about the Second Assessment Reports (SAR) summary of 1996. In that report, the statement, “The balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate,” was inserted into the summary after the report had gone through scientific peer review.
In the TARs Summary, a major conclusion of the report has once again been inserted after the peer review process was completed. According to Patrick Michaels, a University of Virginia climatologist, the Summary “dramatically increased the upper limit of its forecast [from the SAR] of the 21st centurys temperature increase, from 4.5 degrees C to 6.0 degrees C.”
“But,” said Michaels, “the document the IPCC sent out for scientific peer review contained no such number. Indeed, after the scientists reviewed it, the maximum value was 4.8 degrees C.” This alteration “inserted after the document had circulated among scientific reviewers,” said Michaels, changed the “reports most crucial conclusion at the 11th hour, after the scientific peer review process had concluded.”
The change was inserted during the “Government Review” in which nonscientist reviewers comment on the draft. According to Michaels, “The 6 degree C figure is based upon a socio-climatological model,” which “relies upon a number of illogical scenarios called storylines.” These storylines first appeared in a non-peer reviewed paper by Tom Wigley, a climatologist at the U.S. National Center for Atmospheric Research, published by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, a Kyoto cheerleader group. Indeed, Pews press release announcing the study said that Wigleys scenarios would be incorporated into the IPCC report.
Finally, according to Michaels, the IPCCs peer review process “isnt really peer review in the classic sense, for the IPCC retains veto power.” Under real peer review, the reviewers comments must be incorporated into a study, but under the IPCCs system, “It is up to the original authors to review the scientific comments and decide which to keep and which to ignore.”
Political Slant is Clear in IPCC Summary
Cooler Heads has compared copies of the April and October drafts of the IPCCs Summary for Policymakers. The changes between the two drafts reveal the political motives behind the whole IPCC process. The overall tone of the Summary went from one of inquisitiveness to one of assertion.
Several headings were changed. Headings such as “Is the climate changing?” and “How well do we model climate and understand climate changes?” were changed to “An increasing body of observations gives a collective picture of a warming world and other changes in the climate system” and “Confidence in the ability of models to project future climates has increased.”
Some changes are blatant attempts to present a more alarmist tone. Statements that bolster catastrophic warming claims were accompanied by statements of uncertainty in the April draft, but were eliminated in the October draft. Statements that cast doubt on the manmade global warming hypothesis had statements of uncertainty added in the October draft. For example, the April draft states that there has been a 40 percent decrease in Arctic summer or early autumn sea-ice extent, but that “Limited sampling, however, leaves open the possibility that these changes may not reflect broad areas of the Arctic.” This caveat is dropped from the October draft.
The April draft also states, “The observed changes in the intensity and frequency of tropical and extratropical storms, such as hurricanes, are dominated by interdecadal-to-multidecadal variations, with no clear long-term trends. There is no evidence for systematic changes in severe local storms, such as tornadoes.” The October draft repeats the observation that there is no clear evidence of long-term trends in hurricane frequency, but adds that, “data are often sparse and inadequate.” This occurs repeatedly throughout the draft.
The section on climate modeling underwent significant alterations to bolster claims about accuracy. The statement from the April draft, “The complexity of the processes in the climate system prevents the use of extrapolation of past trends or statistical and other empirical techniques for projection of the future,” was dropped from the October draft. Also, the April draft claims that several models have been able to reproduce 20th century climate driven by natural as well as manmade forcings, but the October draft only mentions manmade forcings.
Two statements in the April draft, “Simulation of some extreme weather events, such as hurricanes, remains problematic,” and “Based on the record of past climate changes, we know that the possibility of rapid and irreversible changes in the climate system exists, such as altered ocean circulation patterns. However, there is a large degree of uncertainty about the likelihood of such transitions,” were dropped in the October draft. Added to the October draft, however, is the extremely controversial claim that, “Some aspects of model simulations of ENSO, monsoons and the North Atlantic Oscillation have improved.”
Forecasts of CO2 concentrations, as well as temperature changes, were different in the two drafts. In April the projected atmospheric CO2 concentrations were given as 550 to 800 parts per million by 2100. In October it became 540 to 970 ppm. The summary noted that the 1996 SAR forecast a temperature change of 1.5 to 4.5 degrees C over the next 100 years. The April draft put the range at 1 to 5 degrees C. In October, it became 1.5 to 6 degrees C.
Since nothing changed within the TAR itself from April to October, it is clear that the numbers have been fudged to bolster the pro-Kyoto, anti-energy agenda.
Clinton Seeks to Regulate CO2
In an effort to keep the Kyoto negotiations alive, President Clinton has called for federal regulations to limit CO2 emissions. The plan calls for a “cap and trade” system similar to U.S. emissions trading programs to control smog and acid rain.
According to the New York Times (November 10, 2000), “Any such expansion of pollution rules would probably require action by Congress, where there is significant opposition to the idea. But the administration contends that without this kind of step, a global treaty to reduce the risks of global warming will probably fail.” Currently there are no federal laws that would allow regulation of CO2 emissions.
Clintons announcement was timed to co-incide with release of the final version of the National Assessment on Climate Change, which otherwise attracted little media notice. The National Assessment has been mired in controversy and is currently the target of a lawsuit filed by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, Consumer Alert, 60 Plus Association, Heartland Institute, Rep. Joe Knollenberg, Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, and Sen. James Inhofe.