COP21: State commits to EU plan for 40% emissions reduction

COP21 opens in Paris on Monday with much higher expectations and hopes than the previous global effort in Copenhagen six years ago.

COP stands for Conference of Parties and refers to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

Get used to the alphabet soup of acronyms: there will be a lot between now and December 11th.

The ambition is extraordinary and almost unachievable. It is to get all 196 countries in the United Nations to agree to put measures in place in their own countries with the aim of confining increases in global temperatures to 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels.

So far, 160 countries have signed pledges setting out what they intend to do. Some are conservative, others ambitious but achievable.

On Monday many world’s leaders will gather in Paris for a leaders’ day.

With memories of the recent barbarity in the French capital, it is expected that that awful Friday will be marked in a formal way.

Late on Monday Taoiseach Enda Kenny will set out Ireland’s position on climate change to the conference.

Reduce emissions

Ireland will not go to the conference with a unique position. The European Union has submitted its plan and Ireland is a party to this. It commits the EU to reduce emissions by at least 40 per cent by 2030.

Its plan also includes a call that the Paris conference send out a strong signal that poor and vulnerable countries will be supported in their transitions.

The issue of climate justice is never far away from COP conferences. There are low-lying islands in the Indian Ocean particularly vulnerable to being wiped out by flooding if global temperatures rise.

There are other developing countries which do not have the resources to build the infrastructure to mitigate against climate change, or to adapt to its impact.

To achieve equality, there has to be some transfer of either funding, technology or infrastructure from richer (mostly western) countries to these poorer countries.

Burden

Ireland is fully supportive of the EU position. Its share of that 40 per cent reduction will be determined during negotiations in Brussels in 2016.

Obviously, the Government will be arguing that Ireland’s proportion of that burden should be fair and equitable (ie, lower than 40 per cent).

Ireland’s Achilles’ heel in this regard is agriculture, which comprises 45 per cent of the country’s emissions (outside the manufacturing and power industries, which are included in the emissions trading scheme).

No matter how good the technology is, it can’t reduce that percentage figure by more than four or five points.

Ireland will argue that its reliance on agriculture, as well as its sustainable methods, should be recognised.

Recognition of afforestation and land use will also farm a core of the State’s argument.

When the Taoiseach gets up to speak on Monday, he will also be able to say that Ireland is one of the relatively small group of countries that has passed climate change legislation – the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Bill has just finished its passage through the Dáil.

It attracted some controversy for not including specific long-term target but recent amendments have strengthened the law.

In particular, a late amendment included a specific and explicit commitment to climate justice – an important concession.

Negotiations

Over the fortnight of talks, senior officials from the Department of the Environment will form part of the wider EU team in the negotiations.

Minister for the Environment Alan Kelly will arrive for the second week of negotiations and give political leadership to the team.

Officials say that success would be “an ambitious legally binding agreement in Paris that ensure that all parties will participate in the global effort to combat climate change”.

A rise of more than 2 per cent in average global temperatures or more is not just an abstract concept.

An Environmental Research Centre Report in 2006 summarised potential vulnerability for Ireland.

This included a sea level rise; an increase in river flooding; loss of coastal habitats; increased incidences of coastal flooding; increased frequency of forest fires and pest infection; changes in distribution of plants and animals as well as more intense cyclonic and extreme precipitation events.

That is why a successful outcome of COP21 is seen as urgent and necessary.