Politicians, industry leaders and environment groups across the world welcomed the news last night that Russia had rejuvenated international efforts to combat climate change by ratifying the Kyoto protocol. President Vladimir Putin’s decision isolates the United States, and brings Russia closer economic and political ties with the European Union.
The treaty, which commits 30 industrialised countries into legally binding greenhouse gas reduction targets, will kick-start a multibillion- pound carbon trading market, the transfer of clean technologies to developing countries and promote joint ventures with countries in the former Soviet bloc. It is also a blow to President George Bush who repudiated the treaty on taking office and has repeatedly tried to persuade Putin to do the same.
Russia’s move means that US business will be cut out of the new carbon trading markets which have already been set up in London. Countries and companies in the scheme have targets to cut their carbon dioxide emissions. If they exceed their targets they will be able to sell the extra carbon ”saved” to other countries or companies which have failed to do so. The market is expected to be worth tens of billions of dollars a year.
Carbon trading and incentives to install renewables and other clean technologies in the treaty gives European companies a financial advantage in joint trading agreements with former Eastern bloc and developing countries.
Because of the collapse of Russia’s economy in the early 1990s, London traders estimated yesterday that Putin’s government has $10-billion of carbon credits to sell on the international markets to countries which cannot meet their own targets.
A flurry of international excitement about Kyoto began on Thursday after the Russian Cabinet announced that it had prepared the papers to ratify the treaty and was forwarding them to the Russian Parliament, or Duma, for ratification. Since Putin’s United Russia party controls two-thirds of the Duma, and he directed the Cabinet to act, ratification is seen as a virtual certainty.
The Kyoto protocol, negotiated in 1997, ties those countries of the industrialised world which have signed up to it into carbon dioxide reductions of around 5% on 1990 levels.
Scientists say that cuts of 60% are needed across the world to avoid runaway climate change, mass extinctions and catastrophic sea level rise.
However, the treaty was only seen as a first step, and when the first cuts are implemented by 2010 the process is expected to continue, setting tougher targets for 2020.
Making a major speech on climate change two weeks ago, Tony Blair emphasised the need to begin thinking beyond 2010 to bring China and India into the process of reducing greenhouse gases. He has already said he will make climate change his priority for his presidency of the G8 next year.
The executive secretary of the UN Climate Change Convention, Joke Waller-Hunter, said: ”President Putin has given an inspiring signal to the international community. By giving industry, local authorities and consumers incentives to take action on climate change, Russia and the 29 other industrialised countries that have joined the protocol will set themselves on a path to greater economic efficiency.”
Margaret Beckett, the environment secretary, described it as ”a crucial step forward”. As far as the US was concerned it ”opened up a different vista. The US has long since assumed that Kyoto was dead but it is not. There will be voices in US industry saying ‘we are missing out here’. It is early to say where this will lead but this will make a considerable difference.”
The protocol is a legally binding addition to the 1992 climate change convention. The EU as a whole is committed to an 8% reduction on greenhouse gas emissions on 1990 levels by 2010 and is struggling to reach the target. Some countries will have to buy in carbon from countries such as Russia which have credits to spare.
The UK, which has a 12,5% reduction target, is on course to exceed this by about 3% but is unlikely to sell any spare carbon, saving up any extra credits for the next negotiating period to 2020. – Guardian Unlimited Â