What happened at Copenhagen, and then at Cancun, means that negotiations and discussions between the states in the BASIC group (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) and the US will have a fundamental impact upon climate change politics. It is certainly desirable that they be joined by the EU if it can find the means to speak with a single voice – since the EU leads the way in actually cutting back emissions, rather than simply setting targets to do so.
Brazil could be a major influence on the world scene. Under President Lula da Silva and his successor, Dilma Rousseff, the country has assumed a much more active role in pushing for effective international strategies to combat climate change. Brazil has quite a different profile from the other large emerging economies. For one thing, it is home to one of the most significant ecosystems on the planet – the Amazon basin. It is hence the frontline country in the struggle against deforestation. How far deforestation can be controlled in the Amazon on its own will have a major effect on how far the worst effects of global warming can be avoided. Surveys show that Brazil’s population has a higher level of concern about climate change and its implications than in most of the developed countries. In a survey taken in January 2011, 90 per cent of Brazilians agreed that climate change is happening and that it is a serious issue.30
Unlike China and India, the energy sector in Brazil contributes only a small proportion of the country’s carbon emissions – a further factor that could enhance the country’s influence over other countries internationally. Only about 17 per cent of Brazil’s total emissions come from energy production, a lower proportion than most other industrialized or industrializing nations in the world. Some 40 per cent of the country’s energy supply is generated by renewable sources, broadly interpreted, provided by a mixture of hydroelectric power, sugarcane (ethanol) and wood-pulp (its hydroelectric power stations, supplied from the water flowing from glaciers, are vulnerable to the effects of climate change).
Beginning in the 1970s, Brazil introduced an ethanol scheme for its transport sector. The programme was extended and intensified following the oil crisis of that decade. (For an account of its influence over the later use of biofuels in Sweden, see above, pp. 127–8). Today it is the world’s largest commercial application of biomass for transport. Virtually all cars in Brazil are capable of switching between ethanol and petrol. A national biodiesel programme was launched a few years ago, aimed at progressively increasing the biodiesel content in diesel fuel. Some beans and plants that readily grow over large parts of Brazil can be used to produce biodiesel.
In 2002, the Brazilian parliament endorsed legislation allowing small independent suppliers, including households, to feed energy into the national grid. In the same year, the government proposed the Brazilian Energy Initiative, designed to increase the spread of renewable energy throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.
President Lula consistently emphasized Brazil’s vulnerability to climate change. During his period of tenure in office, the country was afflicted by unusually severe periods of flooding and of drought, which, in a speech in May 2009, he said were signs of climate change: ‘Brazil is feeling the climate changes that are happening in the world, when there is a deep drought in a place where there’s never been one, when it rains in places where it never rains.’31 In the run-up to Cancun, Lula pointed out that Brazil was one of the few countries with concrete results to point to in terms of reducing carbon emissions. Brazil reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by over 30 per cent from the period between 2004 and 2009 – most of this, as mentioned in chapter 4, came from a substantial reduction in the deforestation of the Amazon area. In common with the other large developing states, the country originally set itself against the principle of legally binding emissions reductions targets. However, following the meetings in Copenhagen, Brazil approved a National Policy on Climate Change and adopted a voluntary target in the Accord of reducing greenhouse gases by 36–39 per cent by 2020 over a 2004 baseline. On current trends, the target will be achieved well before then.
Latin America might very well emerge as an important region for cooperative action on climate change. Several countries, including – besides Brazil – Mexico, Peru, Chile and Ecuador, have experienced unusual bouts of extreme weather over recent times. The leaders of those depending on the Andean glaciers are becoming disturbed by clear and continuing signs of glacier retreat among other indicators of climate change. Mexico followed Brazil in being one of the first countries to set specific carbon reduction targets in 2008, with a pledge to halve carbon emissions by 2050 over 2002 levels.
Mexico of course played host to the Cancun meetings, where President Felipe Calderon stressed the urgency of the need for collective action to reduce emissions on a global scale. Costa Rica has pledged to become carbon neutral by 2021, having been for some while a leader in initiatives to do with sustainability.
In conclusion: why we still need the UN
Innovation at all levels has to be a key aspect of the world’s attempts to contain climate change, and this is as true of international relations as anywhere else. Somehow the slow plod of the UN-brokered negotiations will have to be energized by more immediate and practical interventions and ideas. Three sets of forces are in play in generating such possibilities. One, as stressed throughout this book, is the action of states, working individually, bilaterally or in larger groupings. For better or for worse, a great deal of power in world society still remains in the hands of states, and no other organizations approach them in terms of legitimacy. What the individual nations discussed above actually do, in their interaction with one another and with wider groups of states, will matter enormously.
So also will the responses of business, large and small. Here, as also discussed above in earlier sections, there is a very mixed picture. Some business interests, within the fossil fuel companies themselves and in other carbon-intensive industries, contribute in a fundamental way to the inertia that is causing the level of CO2 in the atmosphere still to rise. Yet the opportunities for more far-sighted entrepreneurs and innovators are huge.
The third influence, of immense importance, is the emergence of a diverse and fizzling global civil society, mediated by electronic means of communication and by the ease of modern transportation. The stunning variety of new groups, local, national and transnational, that have sprung up across the world, offer multiple possibilities for influencing climate change policy in a positive and perhaps dramatically new way.
As an instrument of global governance, the UN may fall well short of what many of us (including myself) would like. Whether or not we can limit some of the most dangerous consequences of climate change will not be settled at the UN. Yet there are very good reasons why the UN climate change negotiations must continue, with all the frustrations they entail. The possibility of achieving a legally binding treaty on carbon reductions, involving at least the large majority of nations, has to stay on the table. The distinction between ‘legally binding’ agreements and ‘voluntary’ ones is less than it looks, because there are few sanctions available to back up international law when it is flouted. But a legally established treaty would have more chance of achieving compliance than a cluster of open pledges. That underlying indispensability of which Hannay speaks remains intact.
If concern about the dangers of climate change becomes more urgent and pressing than it is now – as must happen, at some point because of the very advance of global warming – coping with them could be a means of rehabilitating the United Nations itself. States’ leaders might come to realize that not only can they not do without it, but that lack of effective global governance is a prime reason why those dangers have become so acute.
AFTERWORD
Industrial civilization differs from all previous types of civilization that have gone before. Even the most advanced, such as Rome or traditional China, were regional – they were only able to extend their influence over a specific corner of the world. They made use of inanimate energy, such as water or wind, but
only in a relatively marginal way. Their impact on the natural world was considerable, but mainly confined to modifications of the landscape.
Our civilization is truly global in scope; and it couldn’t exist without the inanimate energy sources that fuel it. For better or worse, modern industry has unleashed a sheer volume of power into the world vastly beyond anything witnessed before. I mean here inanimate power, but also the power of human organization – the complex social, economic and political systems upon which our individual lives now depend. Power cuts two ways. The Enlightenment thinkers saw such capabilities as essentially benign. Thus Marx wrote in a celebrated phrase: ‘Human beings only set themselves such problems as they can resolve.’ Yet from the early days of industrial development there were those who saw the new powers as destructive or as threatening to escape the control of their creators.
The debate continues today and is unresolved. Our civilization could self-destruct – no doubt about it – and with awesome consequences, given its global reach. Doomsday is no longer a religious concept, a day of spiritual reckoning, but a possibility imminent in our society and economy. If unchecked, climate change alone could produce enormous human suffering. So also could the drying up of the energy resources upon which so many of our capacities are built. There remains the possibility of large-scale conflicts, perhaps involving the use of weapons of mass destruction. Each could intersect with the others, as analysed in the previous chapter.
No wonder many take fright. Let’s go back! Let’s return to a simpler world! They are entirely understandable sentiments and have practical application in some contexts. Yet there can be no overall ‘going back’ – the very expansion of human power that has created such deep problems is the only means of resolving them, with science and technology at the forefront. There will probably be nine billion people in the world by 2050 – after which world population hopefully will stabilize, especially if the least developed countries make significant economic and social progress. Ways will have to be found of providing those nine billion people with a decent way of life.
What hope is there that, as collective humanity, we will be able to control the forces we have unleashed? No clear-cut answer can be given, since there are so many contingencies, unknowns – and, yes, unknown unknowns – involved. What one can say is that risk and opportunity belong together; from the biggest risks can also flow the greatest opportunities, if collectively we can mobilize to meet them. Something of a quantum leap, however, is needed over the situation as it stands now.
To some considerable degree we are in the hands of our political leaders. It has become customary to be cynical about politics, but the political field retains its capacity to inspire. The use of political capacity, national and international, will be essential to coping with the dilemmas that confront us. Two countries, the United States and China, have the ability to make or break our chances of success. Of course, bilateral cooperation, even in this unique case, can only get us so far. If ever a problem called for multilateral cooperation, with every country in the world on board, climate change is it. As with the internal policies of states, the ‘how’ matters more than the ‘what’. Target-setting isn’t going to have much impact, but many other forms of collaboration can do so. The sharing of scientific findings, technology transfer, direct aid coming from some nations to others, and a host of other collaborative activities are the way forward.
Within the industrial countries there are many political battles to be fought and won. The US is in prime position because of its large-scale contribution to greenhouse gas emissions and its gargantuan appetite for oil. It will be a colossal task to turn around a society whose whole way of life is constructed around mobility and a ‘natural right’ to consume energy in a profligate way. Yet it isn’t as hopeless an endeavour as it looks. Numerous states, cities and organizations within the country have not only been pressing for change but are leading the way in introducing it.
All governments face deep dilemmas in reconciling climate change and energy policy with sustaining popular support, especially in times of economic difficulty. Public support is likely to wax and wane, for reasons I have discussed. In order to cope, governments will have to resort to a range of strategies, while at the same time trying to foster a more widespread consciousness of the need for action. The habits and routines of everyday life stand in the way, but the key problem is the difficulty of getting people to accept that the risks are real and pressing.
Economic and political power in the international system is clearly moving from the established industrial countries of the West towards the newly developing states. It looks more and more possible that countries such as China, India and Brazil, rather than playing catch-up, could assume a leadership position in climate change policy, stepping into the vacuum left by the incapacity of the US to take the lead on a federal level. Although such nations, especially China and India, are a very long way away from breaking away from a carbon-intensive path of development, a major change in political orientation is occurring.
Technological innovation is one of the several jokers in the pack – the more so given the diversity of technologies vying for attention as we seek to shake free from our dependency on fossil fuels. Much can be done to reduce emissions without further advance. Yet the realm of technology is the most important domain where the theorem applies that the very expansion of power that has created dangers for us can perhaps allow us to meet them. A new Dark Ages, a new age of enlightenment, or perhaps a confusing mixture of the two – which will it be? Probably the third possibility is the most likely. In that case, we all have to hope that the balance will be tilted towards the enlightenment side of the equation.
NOTES
Chapter 1 Climate Change, Risk and Danger
1. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Fourth Assessment Report, 3 vols and summary (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).
2. IPCC Working Group 2, Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).
3. S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming (New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2007).
4. Ibid., p. xi.
5. Patrick J. Michaels, Meltdown (Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 2004).
6. See Bjørn Lomborg, The Skeptical Environmentalist (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001). Also see the writings of the scientist Richard Lindzen – for example, ‘Climate of Fear’, Wall Street Journal, 12 April 2006; ‘There is no “Consensus” on Global Warming’, Wall Street Journal, 26 June 2006; ‘Debunking the Myth’, Business Today 43 (2006). A critical examination of Lomborg’s claims is available at www.lomborg-errors.dk.
7. Bjørn Lomborg, Cool It (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2007), p. ix.
8. Bjørn Lomborg, quoted in Howard Friel, The Lomborg Deception (Yale: Yale University Press, 2010), p. 4.
9. Friel’s book, however, can be subject to criticism. Much of it consists of showing that Lomborg doesn’t represent the work of the IPCPC accurately – it is a sort of ‘internalist’ critique rather than a systematic appraisal of the evidence. This leads the author into one highly unfortunate oddity. Lomborg wrote that the Himalayan glaciers, according to the IPCPC, will run dry towards the end of the century. However, Friel points out that the IPCPC report says that they could disappear by the year 2035 – the very statement that was found to be in error.
10. Bjørn Lomborg (ed.), Smart Solutions to Climate Change: Comparing Costs to Benefits (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), p. 396.
11. Christopher Booker and Richard North, Scared to Death (London: Continuum, 2007), p. 454. For a recent addition to the ranks of the sceptics, see Nigel Lawson, An Appeal to Reason (London: Duckworth, 2008). His conclusion is: ‘We appear to have entered a new age of unreason, which threatens to be as economically harmful as it is profoundly disquieting. It is from this, above all, that we really do need to save the planet’ (p. 2). Similar ideas are presented, in somewhat le
ss florid fashion, in Colin Robinson, Climate Change Policy (London: Institute of Economic Affairs, 2008).
12. Booker and North, Scared to Death, p. 388.
13. For an account, see Fred Pearce, The Climate Files: The Battle for the Truth About Global Warming (London: Guardian Books, 2010).
14. Pennsylvania State University: RA-10 Final Investigation Report Involving Dr Michael E Mann, 4 June 2010, p. 19.
15. Quoted in Les Hickman, ‘Threats Leave US Climate Scientists in Fear for Lives’, Guardian, 6 July 2010, p. 16.
16. Clive Hamilton, Requiem for a Species (London: Earthscan, 2010); and other publications.
17. UK Met Office, Statement from the UK Science Community, 10 December 2009, available online.
18. Letter to Science Magazine, 7 May 2010.
19. James Hoggan and Richard Littlemore, Climate Cover-Up (Vancouver: Greystone, 2009), p. 3. For further documentation, see Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway, Merchants of Doubt (London: Bloomsbury, 2010).
20. Martin McKee, quoted in Debora Mackenzie, ‘Special Report: Age of Denial’, New Scientist, 15 May 2010, p. 39.
21. See also James Lovelock, The Revenge of Gaia (London: Penguin, 2007).
22. David King and Gabrielle Walker, The Hot Topic (London: Bloomsbury, 2008), p. 80.
23. See Michael Glantz, Currents of Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). Over the past decade, new weather forecasting methods have been developed to give advance warning of El Niño some two years ahead, making it possible for countries affected to prepare in advance.
24. James Hansen et al., ‘Target Atmospheric CO2, Where Should Humanity Aim?’, NASA/Goddard Institute for Space Studies, New York, 2007, available online.
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