- Date: "2016-01-21"
- Title: "We'll always have Paris"
- Scheduled_start_time: 17:30
- Scheduled_end_time: 19:00
- Subtitle: "How COP21 produced a new international climate agreement - and why it just might work"
- Location: London
- Country: GB
- Institutions: University College London
- Departments: Institute for Public Policy Research and School of public Policy
- Speakers: Michael Jacobs
- Audio_URL: "N/A"
- Video_URL: "N/A"
Kicks off describing COP21 as "a considerable triumph, much more considerable than anyone observing could have expected".
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First legally binding agreement since Kyoto.
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Previously we’ve had ones that were legally binding but not IN (Cancun?) or UN but not legally binding (Copenhagen) but not both.
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But this isn’t a treaty? Why? Because Americans don't like em, if it was US can’t get it ratified domestically.
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But even if it isn’t a treaty it is legally binding - 340 uses of the word SHALL - which “any lawyer will tell you” is legally binding under international law.
So this is significant, why were were able to achieve this? His story will see three different sets of processes at work:
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Economic
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Political
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Diplomatic
Two “Remarkable Objectives”
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Not just to hold the world to 2ºC but to aim for the more ambitious 1.5ºC mark. To put this in context we’ve already warmed the world to 1ºC… so that leaves us with just .5ºC to play with. Some scientists think this may not even be possible but it is now the legally bound aim - ambitious.
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Even more importantly - it defines what such a ‘limit’ means, as emissions - on a net. basis (ie. Emissions - Sequestration). These will have to have reached 0 by the second half of the century. He praises this as a highly ambitious goal, “given that we’ve had rising emissions [up until this point]” and “80% of all energy currently comes from fossil fuels” it is an extraordinary thing to have agreed.
Agreement commits to a new ‘stocktake’ once every 5 years, and then with signatories agreeing to strengthen their commitments two years after that (ie 2020) in line with the latest scientific evidence. [Huw - I wonder if this will replace IPCC’s AR6 or if the two will be a parallel/complementary process, either way sounds like this will now be the most important document on the science of climate change internationally]
The agreement also marks a new approach to developing countries:
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It states adaptation is as important as mitigation
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A new concept in the field of international climate change "loss and damage" - even after adaptation and mitigation there are still those who will lose out, there is now a mechanism to address that (eg his case low lying islands may still sink) [Huw - presumably they can now use this to seek redress? Not clear what the effect of this is - he doesn’t seem sure yet either...]
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Commitment to finance for developing nations $100bn /annum finance to 2025, more after.
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More technology.
The agreement also states how progress is to be monitored.
- Agreement to a single unified system for developed and developing countries to monitor progress (previously they had been separate) every country will be now be under the same regime.
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They are legally binding at the level of the rules.
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However the commitments under these rules will not be legally binding at an international level - but instead will be secured as national commitments at a domestic level. [Huw - ie. each nation commits to go back to their parliament ect and turn these into domestic law]
- This agreement comes into force when 55 countries and 55% emissions ratify it - after that point is is active. Previously we'd thought it'd lay dormant until 2020 when Kyoto runs out... Paris could come into force before, and may well do so.
The costs of solar PV and wind power have fallen massively. Solar prices are now rapidly reaching parity with fossil fuel power. x12 fold drop for solar [Huw - since when?] about a 1/2 for wind since 2000.
The predictions of how these low costs will alter the global energy mix are “dramatic”. Fossil are set to be replaced by solar, window and to some extent nuclear.
But it isn't just the energy - Amazon deforestation peaked in 2004 (though there was a slight uptick last year [Huw - 2014/15?] so let’s cautiously watch for trends). This is while increasing the food supply. The underlying story is of innovation completely change the way that emissions get produced.
Silicon valley is now in a race to combine energy tech with communications tech to revolutionize the sector.
He has an anecdote about Tesla and Renault who are in a fight to develop battery tech for cars, combining such battery tech with variable and intermittent renewable sources will have a dramatic effect on the energy supply. China's emissions last year were stable.
There is now a huge industry dedicated to reducing emissions - $5.5 trillion per annum - lots of companies are getting stuck in. Why? These are markets for businesses that are driven by government regulation.
Emissions trading schemes are now operating in over 40 countries (including china which will start next year).
So climate policy that used to be heavily resisted by businesses are now far more open to it, "a very significant development in the nature of climate politics".
And the result is that the carbon intensity of the global economy is falling (not fast enough but it is falling).
The implications of this: now there is a very different political settlement - there is still resistance and there will continue to be, many fossil fuel companies are deeply entrenched into states (gasprom, sinopec), but there is now a rising lobby of renewable tech.
An example of this changing landscape is the current fight in the US over cheap imported chinese solar panels, many manufacturers want a tariff put on to boost domestic production, but there is also a new lobby of solar installers who are arguing to keep Solar PV as cheap as possible. His point: interests are now far more diverse than previously (implied as a mainly power of fossil fuel corporate lobbying giants).
Science and scientists took a beating after Copenhagen, especially in the US - climate skepticism bloomed and the IPCC came under fire for Himalayan glacial melt, there were the leaked emails (“climategate”)...
However after the IPCC’s AR5 the scientific case was restated. The IPPC made the dramatic point if we are to hold the world to 2 degrees carbon emissions have to go to 0.
Carbon Tracker Initiative <- took up the idea of the IPCC's carbon budget and matched that to the world's energy reserves. Their point was around 80% of all reserves will need to stay in the ground - thus we are in a carbon bubble, the value of companies that factor carbon reserves into their assets are inherently overvalued. This story was initially rubbished by the financial community. However in 3 years this has gone from a carbon NGO to Mark Carny setting up a new process under the financial stability board to look at the risks faced by the financial sector due to climate change.
"We mean business" <- a business membership group that recently started arguing for climate change agreements. “When the business community [lends its support it provides policymakers] with a feeling of cover”. We’ve seen other NGOs winning as a lobby eg, US 350.org (largely university based organisation) won just before Paris - Obama will now not support the Keystone pipeline.
Really well focused NGO focused against fossil fuels (instead of just against climate change) have been very successful.
So all of this is converging, which hands over to the space for diplomats to make agreements.
A core thread of this was US and China.
A series of meetings before COP "created the conditions that made it likely that we would get an agreement" - most experts thought 'great' but thought it'd be weak - that they'd agree to agree but not much else... but then.. 43 small countries began organising.
The framework depends on consensus - which gives smaller states a larger power compared to trade and economic talks where they are mostly marginalised. They also have the moral high ground - his joke... "some small island nations say... it's the only high ground we have". The framework makes this movement of 43 countries possible.
Because they wanted strong litigation they managed to get the EU on side, and then the US - they all got behind the "climate vulnerable forum" -> they turned this into the high ambition coalition, which many experts had not anticipated. Led by the Royal Marshall Islands (population of a few thousand) they convened this coalition that ended up leading the US.
Also... the french. Did an excellent job organising everything. So a well put together conference, with this driving power of the climate vulnerable forum that formed the high ambition coalition, made possible because of the foundation of US, Chinese talks and because the business, economic and political case seemed to have given all states enough cover... led to a good outcome.
It is capitalism that will solve this - they will have to implement the change. What this agreement says/signals to them is the future global economy is low carbon.
Environmental tech is going from a national level to a unified global market set by this agreement and the political signals are also to business and civil society that you have a moment every 5 years where you can build up pressure - there will be a global moment once every five years where you can put pressure on politicians to engage with higher ambition. This moment also gives a chance for diplomacy and
Yes, until relatively recently, last two years. It was very sad, because there was a period after the oil crisis where they put a lot of effort into energy efficiency which then flat lines in the Bush era. So we lost all the gains we could of had in that period. So when Obama first came in he thought he had to do it via congress, he started fighting for that in 2008-200=09/ 2009-2010 but eventually gave up - so then everyone thought it was dead.
So then he realised he could do that via executive order, so he got the supreme court to weigh in if CO2 could be deemed a pollutant - when they said yes he could then take climate policy into the hands of the executive under the Clean Air Act.
Last Year Obama put all of this together into a plan. Meanwhile many american states have also been acting, many of them have energy policy that looks to implement renewables. Also shale gas has helped lower US emissions by displacing coal (but most of that has gone to europe and been burned - which is another story)
Q. It's clear that much of this change (in the US) is administration dependant so how worried should be about the next president?
He jokes about Trump and Palin being scary under any circumstances. He reckons any democratic candidate would take it up. But stump speeches aside moderate republicans might also have to - though it seems clear some of them deliberately would not as anti-climate change has become an article of faith to some on the right.
Most of the states would carry on doing what they are doing, but at a federal level the picture could well change.
Q. Should the carbon budget be smaller (we've seen perhaps greater sensitivity and temp rises in the last few years)
Numbers are tricky.
So when we say we need to reduce to 42 gigatonnes by 2050 this is only to get a 66% chance of stopping us at 2 degrees. So this a 2/3 chance of getting these numbers based on our understanding of the models. And these models are changing! So none of these numbers should be seen as very much more than heuristics to keep us on course. They are all probabilistic numbers, so we will have to revise these numbers. There is an advantage now that every 5 years we will have to collectively revise these in the stocktake.
Not yet, it's still more expensive to go renewable than not, and entrenched interests are still massive, but it's much easier than it was before. Now prices are closer you don't need such massive subsidy regime to put it over the edge. The cost reduction has made it far easier to introduce policy in most parts of the world.
In developing countries there is now a very powerful reason to be doing this that has nothing to do with climate change - and that is Air Pollution. Eg Beijing. Air pollution is killing people and is a major source of environmental and social protest/unrest, Air pollution in Indian cities is worse + traffic congestion... there are very many associated reasons to work against fossil fuels that will help push developing countries down a beneficial route- also energy security, eg India that makes a huge deal of its coal because it has reserves, ends up importing loads and using loads of its foreign reserves to buy it. So the high carbon path to development is perhaps not as attractive as it used to be, especially if there is an alternative.
Q. Economic story drives the political story -> in light of dire productions what effect would a downturn have on this positive outlook.
Downturn has a paradoxical effect, the slower economic growth - the lower emissions are. So climate quite likes a downturn.
That said, one of the biggest stories of last year was that the IEA did it's preliminary predictions of emissions and seems to reckon they have flattened out even despite global growth. Chinese emissions seem flat, brazilians peaked a while ago... so first thing is that it looks in some form like we're flattening out. there's likely to be a very long plateau - if you have 3% global growth you need to have more than 3% reduction in emissions or less than neutral - to make emissions rates fall significantly you'd need 6% or more reductions for a standard 3% global growth.
Investors are often not really sure what to do, they're not investing and they're just holding onto cash - this is a problem for economic growth. There’s also something strange going on with oil prices. Previously we’d have expected a low oil price to drive carbon emissions, as people bought more - but it seems that is not the case. Partly this is because we’re just using oil less, particularly for power where it is less and less a significant source, even a low oil price is still not outcompeting renewable alternatives.
The low price also has an effect on production/exploration. Tar sands or Artic needs oil at a much higher rate to make it work.
Q. London exceeded its annual pollution limits in a week, from your experience in gov how can we get limits taken seriously?
You are quite right, london is very badly polluted. It went through the annual limit in the first couple of days....
There are about 3000 premature deaths due to air pollution in London, why isn't this a bigger issue? His sense is that it will become one. The problem is that you can't comply with European standards unless you completely change the infrastructure of vehicles. Boris can be criticized but the next mayor will also be so… to some extent it’s out of their control.
Q. You emphasized the importance of the fall in the price in renewable energy, why has this happened? Obviously this is tech, but tech requires investment - so how has this happened?
So let's take the case study of solar, why has it fallen so far? The reason is a combination and an interactive one of public policy, markets and tech. In 1991 germany introduces its first feed in tariff for solar. Germany took a punt, gradually demand in germany and some elsewhere in Europe.
Gradually scale started to grow so manufacturers can do more, so gradually you also get more incentive to innovate.
Then Chinese demand for solar comes online, manufacturers have a much bigger market now, then china starts to build them!
So it is not the market on it's own, or policy on it's own it is both, of course that is what good policy does - it drives markets. Same with amazonian deforestation, that's been driven by the enforcement.
That in a nutshell is what's so great about the [COP 21] agreement it drives markets.
Q. In the context of refugee situation in germany the gov attempted to put a fuel tariff on that will make money to pay for refugees, he has been publicly trashed for this - don't you think climate still comes well down the political agenda?
It's never easy to do this, the British example is good. Britain was instrumental in Paris - the UK government 'played a blinder in paris' - and yet we come back and we find the Tory Gov has repealed or turned it's back on 15 bits of climate change policy since July. So there's this gap between the international and domestic level. Climate change policy needs to be fought for all the time because the entrenched interests are huge. But it's easier than it's been until now - there is greater opposition to interests and now there is Paris - which is why I am optimistic, by and large countries do what they say in these agreements.
Q. Stephen hawking's article - can we trust humanity to recognise its commitment to future generations
Let's be careful about what we mean by future generations, his (20 year old son) will be in his prime when much of this is happening.
Would it be better for China/india to grow rich now and deal with the problem later? We reckon the high carbon path is no longer viewed as a good path - it's polluted and it's no longer the only way you can get by without deforestation and with food, with public transport and with better air quality. That is why China is behind this...
Will this be sufficient? who knows? but that developing countries now think they don't need to pollute to grow...
In the past we fought over carbon emissions because we saw them as tied to growth, we will only solve this when we no longer care about carbon because it's viewed as worthless. He likes to stay the stone age didn't end because we ran out of stone - if we can't reach that stage we won't get there.
Q. all these things we should be doing, I don't see much of this from the Uk gov, how are they doing?
So the interesting question in UK politics is the 5th carbon budget. which is the amount we are allowed to pollute. that is the moment where all the people who care about this will put pressure on the Uk gov, so we will see the level of commitment then. and this will happen again once every 5 years as part of the Paris enabled review process... the fact this is happening again and again is going to give a chance for these pressures to be brought to bare.
Q. It is nice to hear you are optimistic, this questioner isn't. You start off by saying that this agreement is ambitious but then you spent 40 mins saying we're on this trajectory anyway. Also to what extent should we be worried that indigenous rights isn't included in the text.
The facts:
Climate change is happening and it will accelerate - whatever and despite what we do now. The next 30 years is set. We are going to experience pretty terrible climate change. Rise of temperature will have a dramatic effect on climatic patterns. So... when you say i'm optimistic, I'm not about the course of climate change, it's going to be terrible and 2 degrees is not safe. It’s just what the international community chose as just shy of the worst tipping points, like the breaking off of the west antarctic ice sheet or the tundra methane release etc. The next 30 years are going to look horrible and we need to learn to live in that world.
All of this is about the 30 years after... and if we can do 2 degrees, better if 1.5...
Loss and Damage is a hugely uncertain part of the regime, exactly how this will play out is unclear. Many developing countries would like to be able to sue developed countries or even corporations for loss under climate change. This was ruled as a part of the Paris agreement but they've said they don't need an agreement to sue anyway.
Even if the world is doing all of this... it's not doing it fast enough. To get onto the trajectories we need to speed this up. That is what the [COP 21] agreement is committed to doing.
My optimism arises from the belief that we now have a system open to political commitment to climate change. I think the economic and political forces are there and the agreement give a site where this can come to bare. Pessimism in this field tends to be self fulfilling Fatalism is Fatal Optimism gives us the urgency that we need to take action.