If you were in flood-ravaged KwaZulu-Natal or Mozambique this week, you would have seen the effects of global warning first hand. Sea-level rise and more frequent extreme weather are no longer theory but reality. Most climate scientists now agree that human activity is the main cause of global warming. Millions of people across the world are experiencing what it can do. Yet there is still public apathy. There are no mass Seattle-style protests at the climate change convention in The Hague. The scale of this challenge appears to be too vast and too distant we have 25 to 50 years before the direst predictions kick in to penetrate popular consciousness. What will be needed over the next generation is a huge shift in individual consumer habits, as well as popular pressure on the politicians. So far there is little sign of either.
That is clearly part of the explanation for the lack of impetus and urgency in The Hague. What has emerged so far confirms the pessimism that has settled over the international effort to cut greenhouse gas emissions. The targets set at the 1997 Kyoto meeting of 5,5% cuts on 1990 levels were dismissed as woefully inadequate by scientists who argued that they needed to be of the order of 60% to 80%. But even those targets are unlikely to be achieved. Emissions continue to grow at 1,3% a year, and the United States has acknowledged that it will not achieve its Kyoto target. With only 4% of the world’s population the US is responsible for more than 20% of its carbon emissions. This degree of international irresponsibility is likely to increase if the presidential election goes to George W Bush, who has said he does not believe there is such a thing as global warming.
There is also a danger that the environmentalists’ worst apprehensions for The Hague may come true. They fear that the European Union is so desperate for agreement that it will give in to the US. That would make a mockery of the Kyoto protocol: instead of cuts, it could lead to huge increases in emissions. The biggest source of contention is carbon sinks. The US (backed by Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Russia and Canada) wants to offset its emissions by planting forests that can soak up carbon dioxide. But the science of carbon sinks is terrifyingly imprecise, scientists warn. How much carbon is sequestered, and for how long? Could it be reliably monitored? The whole benefit is lost if there is a forest fire. The most effective carbon-sequestrating trees are not those that nurture biodiversity. Young trees do a better job than old trees, which raises the ludicrous possibility of chopping down old forests to plant new ones to be claimed as carbon sinks.
The truth is that the international effort to curb global warming has been hijacked by the US and driven into a quagmire. The ideological commitment of the US to market mechanisms ensured that global warming would be tackled by creating a market to buy and sell the right to pollute the world’s atmosphere. The US wanted to use the power of its dollar to buy its way out of cuts at home. The construction of this market has led to four years of wrangling that could yet scupper agreement. The process has since left all but the most ardent environmentalists confused. Europe’s experience of tackling environmental pollution is that regulation delivers greater cuts than market mechanisms. The conclusion must be that there are serious limits to what the market can achieve in the face of an environmental challenge of this magnitude.
Other absurdities have found their way on to The Hague agenda. There is a danger that a conference dedicated to saving the planet may relaunch the nuclear industry. The clean development mechanism was designed to encourage rich countries to help poor ones to develop by investing in renewable energy.
The signs are that the politicians will reach an agreement this week, but it will do little to slow the quickening pace of global warming. Yet the historic significance of Kyoto remains undiminished. It may have proved far less of a breakthrough than first envisaged, but we cannot afford to fail. So this experiment will come to dominate the 21st century. In the end its chance of success depends less on the politicians than on their electorates grasping the implications of what faces them, and resolving to change their lives accordingly.
Two and a half cheers
We welcome the decision of the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs, Phumzile MlamboNgcuka, to appoint two new investigations into the latest state oil scandal.
Last week we published an editorial criticising her silence on the investigators’ identities, apparently out of fear of jeopardising their probe. Hours after the Mail & Guardian hit the streets, her department said that British intelligence company Kroll Associates and a local senior advocate, Nazir Cassim, would be tasked with investigating recent events at the Strategic Fuel Fund.
As we reported three weeks ago, senior officials at the state oil company have quietly ceded control of the country’s remaining strategic oil reserves to a so-called empowerment consortium at an extraordinary cost to the taxpayer and the country’s economic security.
Given the whisperings in the industry about the state oil company’s reluctance to be investigated further, it is now crucial that the probes be conducted as openly as possible.
The lawyer, Cassim, has the easier task that of probing corporate governance issues. There was no tender, the minister was not informed of the deal in terms of legislation governing the state oil company, and it is unclear how much the board itself knew. Kroll has a tougher job: investigating the mechanics of the deal, and possibly finding the smoking gun, in a notoriously oily industry.