Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
articulating a shared set of principles that included acknowledgment that
climate change required immediate cooperative action. Relevant to our
concern with environmental justice, the UNFCCC asked nations to
“protect the climate system . . . on the basis of equity and in accordance
with their
common but differentiated responsibilities and respective
capabilities
” (quoted in Roberts and Parks 2007, 3). However, North-
South politics, along with a poor political environment in the United
States, signaled that an effective treaty would be diffi cult to achieve
(Roberts and Parks 2007; Fisher 2004; Pulver 2005).
Despite these diffi culties, the Kyoto Protocol was negotiated only fi ve
years following Rio. Based on the principle of
common but differentiated
responsibilities
, the parties agreed that industrialized nations (Annex I
countries) would be required to reduce their collective greenhouse gas
emissions by just over 5 percent of 1990 levels by 2012, while developing
nations (non-Annex I countries) would be allowed to increase their emis-
sions over the same time period. Agreement was also reached that the
treaty would not enter force until fi fty-fi ve countries ratifi ed the treaty
and the total emissions represented by Annex I Signatories reached 55
percent of total 1990 carbon dioxide emissions (UNFCCC 2008). The
contested nature of the protocol is illustrated by the fact that this par-
ticipation goal was not reaching until 2005—ten years after the fi rst
Conference of the Parties (COP) met in Berlin—when Russia ratifi ed the
treaty.
The general ethos surrounding the Kyoto Protocol was mixed from
the beginning. Everyone knew the targets established were insuffi cient to
mitigate climate change (Fisher 2004; Newell 2008). Industrialized
nations were bifurcated in their enthusiasm: EU countries, New Zealand,
and Japan most vocally argued that the protocol represented an impor-
tant symbolic step forward that would provide a learn-by-experience
opportunity on the road to transforming the Earth's carbon footprint.
The United States and Australia strongly opposed the principle of
common but differentiated responsibility
on the grounds that it provided
an unfair advantage to their competitors, especially China, India, and
Brazil. Developing countries retorted to this complaint that it was indus-
trialized nations who were responsible for over half of all greenhouse
gas emissions and, thus, it should be their responsibility to make the
largest contribution to their reduction. In other words, the development
potential of Southern nations should not be compromised to solve a
problem that was overwhelmingly caused by the industrialized nations
of the North (Roberts and Parks 2007).
