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Geneva Envoys Seek Consensus on Climate Aid for Poorer Nations
2010-09-02 15:09:05.832 GMT
By Ewa Krukowska and Dylan Griffiths
Sept. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Envoys from more than 40 nations are
in Geneva to brainstorm ways to help poorer nations get the
estimated $100 million a year needed to fight global warming.
Officials from the European Union, Brazil, China, France
and the U.S. are trying to lay the groundwork to reinvigorate
the next round of international climate negotiations later this
year in Cancun, Mexico. Their agenda for the meeting that
started today in Geneva includes a new climate fund,
coordinating public financing and boosting private funding.
"Funding for developing countries holds a key to action,
which is why the meeting that will start today is so
important," Christiana Figueres, the UN diplomat leading the
global climate talks, told reporters in Geneva today.
Negotiators failed at last year's meeting in Copenhagen to
bring China and the U.S., the world's two biggest emitters, into
the 1997 Kyoto treaty that obliges most developed nations to
reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. While Copenhagen yielded a non-
binding agreement for more than 130 countries to provide $100
billion a year of help by 2020, envoys are "backtracking,"
U.S. lead negotiator Jonathan Pershing said last month.
Some nations are demanding more money and others want
carbon-dioxide reductions to apply only to industrialized
countries, Pershing said.
"We aim to establish the roots of a consensus," Franz
Perrez, Switzerland's lead climate-change negotiator, said
yesterday at news conference opening today's meeting.
'Temporary Constraint'
Industrialized nations promised at Copenhagen to provide
$10 billion a year in assistance for poorer counties from 2010
to 2012. Sources of almost all of this so-called fast-track
financing have been identified, with some of it to be
distributed though bilateral agreements between nations Figueres
said today. How to raise and distribute the $100 billion a year
in long-term funds through 2020 is under discussion, she said.
"I believe there's sincerity on the part of industrialized
countries of living up to the pledges that they made in
Copenhagen, both with respect to fast-track as well as long-term
financing," Figueres said. "That sincerity has to be dealt
with in the context of the financial crisis, which we all expect
the world will be able to move out from. It's a temporary
constraint, not a permanent constraint."
The financial crisis, together with the complexity and
uncertainty of climate regulation reduced private investment
last year in emission-reduction projects in developing nations.
While the global carbon market grew 6 percent to $144 billion
last year, the value of investment in project-based activities
dropped 54 percent, according to World Bank data.
Jittery Markets
Under the UN Clean Development Mechanism, the world's
second-biggest carbon market after the European Union cap-and-
trade program, investors can earn tradable credits for investing
in emissions-reduction projects in developing nations. Those
offsets can be used for compliance in the EU market.
Private investment needed to cut emissions enough to limit
the earth's temperature increase since pre-industrial times to 2
degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) is also on the agenda
of the Geneva meeting, co-organized by the Swiss and Mexican
governments.
"Carbon markets are jittery about what will happen after
2012," the International Institute for Sustainable Development
said in briefing notes for the meeting. "Clear policy and
regulatory signals are needed if a stronger global carbon market
is to emerge and private sector investment is to return."
For Related News and Information:
Emission market news NI ENVMARKET <GO>]
Today's top energy stories ETOP <GO>
European power-markets home page EPWR <GO>
--Editors: Mike Anderson, Reed Landberg.
To contact the reporter on this story:
Ewa Krukowska in Geneva at +32-474-620-243 or
ekrukowska@bloomberg.net;
Dylan Griffiths in Geneva at +41-22-317-9203 or
dgriffiths1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Stephen Voss at +44-20-7073-3520 or sev@bloomberg.net
