BIKE: NYT: Kyoto Accord May Not Die (or Matter)

[Jeb Boyt]

>From today's NY Times:

Into Thin Air:  Kyoto Accord May Not Die (or Matter)

Since it was negotiated in Japan in 1997, the Kyoto Protocol, the first 
treaty that would require countries to curb emissions linked to global 
warming, has lingered in an indeterminate state, between enactment and 
outright rejection.

. . .

Even without approval by the United States and Russia — first and fourth on 
lists of the world's largest emitters of heat-trapping "greenhouse" gases — 
the treaty has already changed the world in small but significant ways that 
will be hard to reverse, these experts say.

>From Europe to Japan and the United States, just the prospect of the treaty 
has resulted in legislation and new government and industry policies curbing 
emissions.

The treaty's future impact is limited by deep flaws, many experts say, 
including its lack of any emissions limits on China and other big developing 
countries and its short time frame, with terms extending only to 2012. As a 
result, they add, new approaches must be developed now if atmospheric levels 
of the gases are to be stabilized.

. . .

Regardless of which way Russia steps, the process of moving the world toward 
limiting releases of the gases after more than a century of relentless 
increases has clearly begun, said David B. Sandalow, a guest scholar at the 
Brookings Institution and an assistant secretary of state during the Clinton 
administration who worked on the treaty.

"The standard of success isn't whether the first treaty out of the box sails 
through," he said. "The standard is whether this puts the world on a path to 
solving a long-term problem. Other multilateral regimes dealing with huge 
complex problems, like the World Trade Organization, have taken 45 or 50 
years to get established."

Mr. Sandalow and other experts noted that the European Union had already 
passed a law requiring a cap and credit-trading system for the gases 
starting in 2005. It will follow the pattern laid out in Kyoto no matter 
what happens to the treaty.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/04/international/europe/04CLIM.html

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