Putting a price on carbon is unlikely to prevent deforestation

Three straws in the wind: Two pieces of policy news and a new piece of research.

Two weeks ago, a leaked document from the EU revealed that the European Commission and some member states hope to include oil palm plantations in the definition of forests. Yesterday, the Jakarta Post reported that Indonesia’s Forestry Ministry is drafting a decree to reclassify oil palm plantations as “forests”. 

Last week, the European Commissions Science for Environment Policy put out a News Alert with the headline “Pricing carbon insufficient to save tropical forests from deforestation”.  

There are two related issues here. The first is the definition of “forest”. Currently, the UN defines a forest as any area larger than 500 square meters with crown cover of 10 per cent and trees capable of growing two meters high. Clearly, this definition fails to address the conversion of native forests to mono-culture industrial tree plantations. (Incidentally, the UN has not yet attempted to agree a definition of forest degradation. The latest document from the Ad-hoc Working Group on the Kyoto Protocol, includes two alternative lists of definitions. But the word “degradation” is not included in either list, not even in square brackets.) 

The second issue is whether deforestation (including conversion of forests to monocultures) can be prevented by putting a price on carbon. Recent research, published in Environmental Science and Technology found that putting a price on carbon is unlikely to prevent forests being cleared for oil palm plantations. Part of the problem is that a higher carbon price drives up demand for biofuels (as an alternative to expensive fossil fuels). This in turn increases both the price of biofuels and the likelihood that forests are converted to oil palm plantations.

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Tokyo CO2 Credit Trading Plan May Become A Model

Buildings are silhouetted against the setting sun in front of Mount Fuji in Tokyo December 2, 2009.Photo :Gary Hershorn

12-Feb-10
Risa Maeda- Reuters


TOKYO - A plan to cut carbon dioxide emissions in the heart of Tokyo, one of the world's biggest and richest metropolitan areas, may prompt political action on a stalled national effort. Tokyo city proper will set emission limits for 1,400 large factories and offices to meet by using technology like solar panels and advanced fuel-saving devices starting in April. Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has pledged to cut national greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent by 2020 based on 1990 levels of 1.261 billion tonnes, deeper than a minus 6 percent goal over 2008-2012 under the Kyoto Protocol. Japan has already made strong strides in energy efficiency and combined with an economic slowdown has seen emissions of CO2, the main greenhouse gas, fall 6.5 percent to 1.216 billion tonnes in the most recent fiscal year.

Big emitters like power plants, none located in Tokyo, are likely to respond to volume caps by spending on cleaner energy projects rather than relying on solely conservation or buying carbon credits, according to analysts. For oil consumption, Japan as the world's third largest oil importer, saw consumption fall 6.9 percent to 193 million kilolitres last year, a trend in place since 2006. To cut CO2 by 6 and 8 percent in Tokyo by any factory or office that uses 1,500 kilolitres of oil equivalent, respectively, in the next five years by contrast is a drop in the ocean at less than 500,000 kilolitres of oil equivalent.

If as planned the programme spreads wider nationally and evolves along with variants used elsewhere, it could be a new that thinking brings fresh ideas to global climate talks now stalled because of fierce debates over equity and scale, an academic said.

Copenhagen Accord Turns Direction from Climate Justice

The Copenhagen Accord has yielded very poor results as the developed countries have given very low emission reduction pledges. By the deadlinen on January 31st, about 56 countries had officially written in. Most of them are developed nations. Not many developing countries have signed up so far. And most have taken a wait-and-see approach.The Accord is controversial because it arose from a meeting of only a few countries which was not on the official Conference agenda – the Convention has over 190 member states.

Moreover, the Accord threatens to displace the legitimate multilateral process mandated to follow up from the UNFCCC’s 2007 Bali Conference.The model agreed to in Bali was to set a binding overall target for developed nations to cut their collective emissions. This was initially set at 25% to 40% by 2020 compared to the 1990 level.

The Copenhagen Accord counters the developed countries no longer have to make any binding commitments.Each country merely submits the emission reduction it is willing to undertake. There is also no longer an “aggregate target”.These fears have now been proven to be justified. The pledges of some of the developed countries are so low that the overall reduction is only 12% to 18% by 2020 compared to 1990, according to a paper by the World Resources Institute (WRI).

Even if the high end of the pledges (18%) is realised, this does not meet the 25%-40 reduction that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) indicated is necessary to stabilise greenhouse gas concentrations at 450 ppm or below. Thus the the pledges made by the developed countries do not even meet the Accord’s own standard.

Another report last week, by the scientific Ecofys network, assessed the Copenhagen Accord so far, concluded that they add up to a level of emissions in 2020 that would be in line with a global temperature rise of over 3°C.

GLOBAL TRENDS
By MARTIN KHOR
http://thestar.com.my/columnists/story.asp?file=/2010/2/8/columnists/globaltrends/5634779&sec=globaltrends

55 countries submitted to Copenhagen Accord

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has received submissions of national pledges to cut and limit greenhouse gases by 2020 from 55 countries. These countries together account for 78 per cent of global emissions from energy use.

This represents an important invigoration of the UN climate change talks under the two tracks of Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention and the Kyoto Protocol,” said Yvo de Boer, Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC. The commitment to confront climate change at the highest level is beyond doubt. These pledges have been formally communicated to the UNFCCC.

Industrialised countries listed their mid-term targets to cut emissions:
http://unfccc.int/home/items/5264.php

Developing countries communicated information on their nationally appropriate mitigation actions:
http://unfccc.int/home/items/5265.php