Kyoto Protocol

Introduction

The Kyoto Protocol is a United Nations sponsored agreement that binds nations to reduce their greenhouse-gas emissions. The protocol, drafted and agreed in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997, marked the finalization of years of negotiations that emerged from the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The

Kyoto Protocol was signed by most nations at the 1992 Earth Summit.

Kyoto provided binding reduction targets for six key greenhouse gases by 2012. Proponents argue that the protocol is a landmark agreement among most industrialized nations, the world's largest per capita polluters. Critics assert that weak emissions-reduction targets and a lack of participation from the world's top polluters rendered the Kyoto Protocol ineffective. The protocol itself required ratification by enough industrialized countries to represent 55% of the developed world's CO₂ output—a process that took seven years of negotiations. Kyoto entered into force in 2005, albeit without major polluters, including the United States, India, China, and Australia (who later ratified in December 2007).

Historical Background and Scientific Foundations

At the Earth Summit, staged in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro in 1992, the most important document to come out of the ten-day conference was the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which was signed by most attending nations. This pledged to stabilize greenhouse-gas levels “at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.” It took three more sessions and five years to reach a concrete agreement on reduction targets. The culmination of those meetings, the Kyoto Protocol, was established on December 11, 1997, after ten days of negotiations among ministers from 160 countries. Under Kyoto, industrialized countries would reduce their collective emissions of greenhouse gases by 5.2% by 2012 when set against their 1990 levels. The agreement aimed to lower overall emissions from a group of six greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide; methane; nitrous oxide; hydro-fluorocarbons; perfluorocarbons; and sulfur hexafluoride.

National reductions ranged from 8% for European Union member states and some others, to 7% for the United States, 6% for Japan and Canada, 0% for Russia, and permitted increases of 8% for Australia and 10% for Iceland.

Developing nations were, however, excluded from binding targets on emissions reductions. According to the earlier terms of the UNFCCC, signatories agreed to a set of “common but differentiated responsibilities.” In other words, the developed world took responsibility as the main contributors to greenhouse-gas emissions during the industrialization period that scientists say is responsible for climate change. Instead, the Kyoto Protocol calls on all parties—industrialized and developing—to take a number of steps to formulate national and regional programs to improve local emission factors. It also called for the collation of data and national inventories of greenhouse-gas emissions. Moreover, developing countries were also committed to promote environmentally sound development technologies. When better able to bear the costs, developing nations would then join subsequent emissions treaties.

Although the protocol opened for signature on March 16, 1998, it could only enter into force after it had been ratified by at least 55 countries, including industrialized countries accounting for 55% of the carbon dioxide emissions in 1990. Early on in the process, the United States and Australia made clear that they would not ratify the treaty. Because they collectively accounted for more than 20% of 1990 greenhouse gas emissions, it meant that virtually every other developed country would have to support the Kyoto Protocol for it to ever come into force.

Between 1997 and 2005, the Kyoto Protocol undertook a number of modifications. The most significant of these came at the Bonn Conference in July 2001 when provisions were made to establish funds to assist the world's less-developed nations make the transition to cleaner technologies and monitor their emissions. Amendments also authorized emissions trading, enabling countries to sell their spare emissions rights to other signatory countries. A limited means of accounting for carbon sinks, such as vast forest reserves, was also permitted.

Finally, in Fall 2004, Russia's Parliament agreed to ratify Kyoto, and on February 15, 2005, the protocol came into force. As of December 2007, 175 countries, representing 61.6% of 1990 emissions, had offered their formal support for the Kyoto Protocol. After rejecting the treaty on several occasions, Australia announced that it would ratify the Kyoto Protocol in December 2007.

Impacts and Issues

The United States holds steadfast in its rejection of Kyoto's binding targets for emissions reductions. Although China overtook the United States as the largest emitter of greenhouse gases, the United States remains the world's largest per capita emitter. Even before the final draft of the protocol was agreed to in July 1997, the U.S. Senate unanimously passed the Byrd-Hagel Resolution stating that the United States should not be a signatory to any agreement that did not include binding targets and timetables for developing nations or that “would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States.” Although the administration of President Bill Clinton gave symbolic support to the protocol, with Vice President Al Gore signing it on November 12, 1998, his administration never put the treaty before the Senate for ratification.

Prior to his election in November 2000, President George W. Bush had reiterated the Senate's position over the lack of targets for developing countries, specifically voicing his concern about China and India's vast increase in greenhouse emissions since 1990. Ten weeks after Bush's inauguration as president, on March 28, 2001, a State Department official confirmed a report in the Washington Post that the new administration had asked to explore ways of formally withdrawing the U.S. signature from the Kyoto document. The United States instead opted to reject implementation of the protocol. Because of its refusal to ratify, the United States has never been under any international obligation to decrease its greenhouse emissions by the 7% agreed at Kyoto. Over the period 1990 to 2012, U.S. greenhouse emissions are predicted to increase by as much as 25%.

WORDS TO KNOW

ANTHROPOGENIC: Made by people or resulting from human activities. Usually used in the context of emissions that are produced as a result of human activities.

CARBON BANKING: Form of accounting that tracks the carbon emissions, reductions, and offsets of a client in a way that is analogous to the treatment of money in ordinary banking. A helpful adjunct to emissions trading schemes.

CARBON SINKS: Carbon reservoirs such as forests or oceans that take in and store more carbon (carbon sequestration) than they release. Carbon sinks can serve to partially offset greenhouse-gas emissions.

DEVELOPING NATION: Country that is relatively poor, with a low level of industrialization and relatively high rates of illiteracy and poverty. Sometimes termed less-developed country. The use of “developing” as a euphemism for “poor” contains the built-in assumption that “development,” in the sense of transition to a non-agricultural economy oriented toward perpetual growth, is innately good.

GREENHOUSE GASES: Gases that cause Earth to retain more thermal energy by absorbing infrared light emitted by Earth's surface. The most important greenhouse gases are water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and various artificial chemicals such as chlorofluorocarbons. All but the latter are naturally occurring, but human activity over the last several centuries has significantly increased the amounts of carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide in Earth's atmosphere, causing global warming and global climate change.

U.S. opponents of the Kyoto Protocol assert that the binding targets would negatively impact the U.S. economy, citing the possibility of job loss and increased energy costs. U.S. public opinion on Kyoto is divided; so too are opinions on whether environmental or domestic economic concerns are more important. A Time/CNN Poll, published in April 2001, showed that while 75% of those surveyed consider global warming a “very serious” or “fairly serious” problem, and 67% said the president should develop a program to address it, only 48% said they would be willing to pay 25 cents more for a gallon of gasoline. Although economists disagree about the possible economic impacts of Kyoto implementation on the United States, a sizable majority of the U.S. public (62–71% in various polls) accepts the argument that binding emissions reduction targets could damage the economy. In contrast, many economists assert that development and implementation of green technologies could provide new jobs and bolster long-term economic prospects.

There is, however, growing acknowledgment of Australia and the United States's criticism of the exclusion of developing countries from Kyoto targets. India and China were not regarded as developed economies when the Kyoto Protocol was drafted, but by the start of 2008, many researchers estimated that China had overtaken the United States as the largest volume emitter of greenhouse gases, with India not trailing far behind. Instead of having to fulfill specific targets, China, India and other developing economies are asked to report their emissions levels and develop national climate change mitigation programs.

Another area of contention is the permission of emissions trading. Under the terms of Kyoto, national governments can issue companies tradable certificates that show compliance with targets. Companies involved in energy and power production can then decide to reduce emissions or purchase a certificate from a company with surplus permits. This allows businesses to find the most economical way of fulfilling their emissions targets. However, although a cost burden is placed on production of greenhouse gases, environmentally inefficient industry is not sufficiently discouraged. For example, a CO₂ emitting coal power station could meet its Kyoto obligations by buying surplus carbon credits from a clean-technology wind farm.

Moreover, an overall drop in a country's carbon emissions can be attributable to an economic downturn rather than improvements to industries that emit large amounts of greenhouse gases. This was the case in many former Soviet republics where recession following the collapse of communism stagnated industrial production and development. As a result, greenhouse-gas emissions dropped considerably, giving governments huge surpluses which they were then able to trade with other countries. Thus, the environmental benefit garnered from one country's industrial decline is negated by an expanding economy elsewhere purchasing surplus carbon credits.

“Carbon banking” also remains contentious. A country that exceeds its targets for one year can bank the surplus and use it to offset a subsequent year's emissions totals. For instance, if a country has to reduce emissions by 10%, but actually reduces it by 15% one year, the extra 5% can be used against the following year's target of 10%, essentially negating the previous year's reductions.

The methodology for calculating greenhouse-gas emissions has also come under criticism. In China, for example, because a viable market economy did not exist until the mid–1990s, emissions were calculated on state estimates for industrial production. Such figures were often incorrect, underestimating pre-Kyoto emissions levels. Now, the reverse is suspected, with officials accused of underestimating emissions after a decade of heavy industrialization and urbanization.

Several nations obliged to reduce emissions under the Kyoto Protocol have been accused of misreporting concentrations of greenhouse gases. In 2006, the European Commission Joint Research Center carried out a study that claimed that a number of countries were substantially under-reporting methane emissions. The worst offenders included the United Kingdom, which may be emitting 92% more methane than it declared under the Kyoto Protocol, and France, which may be emitting 47% more than declared.

Although Kyoto is unique in providing binding targets for greenhouse emissions reductions, it was signed without providing penalties for a country that ratifies the protocol then fails to meet its reduction targets. Only later, at the 2001 Bonn Conference was it agreed that countries failing to meet their 2012 emissions targets would be required to suspend emissions credit purchasing and make up their target deficiency, plus a penalty of 30%, during the second commitment period.

IN CONTEXT: UNEQUIVOCAL EVIDENCE

“Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, as is now evident from observations of increases in global average air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow and ice, and rising global average sea level….”

“Eleven of the last twelve years (1995–2006) rank among the 12 warmest years in the instrumental record of global surface temperature (since 1850)….”

Statement of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as formally approved at the 10th Session of Working Group I of the IPCC in Paris, France, during February 2007.

SOURCE: Solomon, S., et al, eds. Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis: Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007.

However, a lack of punitive measures still makes Kyoto easy to undermine. There is no obligation to participate in a secondary commitment period and countries retain the ability to withdraw from the protocol with a year's written notice. The ease at which countries can renege on their Kyoto obligations was exemplified by Canada in 2006, when the incoming Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper made clear that it had no intention of fulfilling the nation's original Kyoto obligations. Although most other developed countries will meet their targets, including the European Union's 27 member states, Japan is predicted by the U.N. to have a 6% emissions increase, instead of its agreed upon target of a 6% emissions reduction.

Finally, some wonder if the Kyoto Protocol goes far enough. Research by Greenpeace asserts that even if they were met, the Kyoto targets will produce an actual overall reduction of gases of just 1% or 2%—falling well short of 60% reduction in greenhouse gases that the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) asserts is necessary to significantly mitigate climate change.

See Also Bonn Conference (2001); United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC); United States: Climate Policy.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Periodicals

“The Heat Is On—Survey: Climate Change.” Economist (September 7, 2006).

“Kyoto Challenge Has Just Begun.” Nature 431 (2004): 613.

Lashof, D. A., and Dilip R. Ahuja. “Relative Contributions of Greenhouse Gas Emissions to Global Warming.” Nature 344 (1990): 529–531.

Lund, H. “The Kyoto Mechanisms and Technological Innovation.” Energy 31 (2006): 2325–2332.

Masood, Ehsan. “Kyoto Agreement Creates New Agenda for Climate Research.” Nature 390 (1997): 390.

Reilly, J., et al. “Multi-gas Assessment of the Kyoto Protocol.” Nature 401 (1999): 549–555.

Web Sites

“Kyoto Protocol Status of Ratification.” United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. <http://unfccc.int/files/essential_background/kyoto_protocol/application/pdf/kpstats.pdf> (accessed November 26, 2007).

“Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.” United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, December 1997. <http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/convkp/kpeng.html> (accessed November 26, 2007).

James Corbett