How Many Nations Are in the Paris Agreement
The initial commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol has been extended to 2012. This year, delegates at COP18 in Doha, Qatar, agreed to extend the agreement until 2020 (excluding some developed countries that had withdrawn). They also reaffirmed their 2011 commitment at COP17 in Durban, South Africa, to create a new comprehensive climate agreement by 2015 that would commit all major emitters not included in the Kyoto Protocol – such as China, India and the United States – to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. The new treaty – which would later become the Paris Agreement – is expected to completely replace the Kyoto Protocol by 2020. However, the Paris Agreement entered into force earlier than planned, in November 2016. The Paris Agreement has a “bottom-up” structure unlike most international environmental treaties, which are “top-down” and are characterized by internationally defined norms and goals that states must implement. [32] Unlike its predecessor, the Kyoto Protocol, which sets commitment-related targets with the force of law, the Paris Agreement, which emphasizes consensus-building, achieves voluntary and nationally defined targets. [33] Specific climate goals are therefore promoted politically and are not legally linked. Only the processes that govern the preparation of reports and the consideration of these objectives are prescribed by international law. This structure is particularly noteworthy for the United States – since there are no legal mitigation or funding objectives, the agreement is considered an “executive agreement rather than a treaty.” Since the 1992 UNFCCC treaty received Senate approval, this new agreement does not need new congressional legislation to enter into force. [33] The Paris Agreement is the first universal and legally binding global climate agreement adopted at the Paris Climate Change Conference (COP21) in December 2015. It is rare that there is consensus among almost all nations on a single issue. But with the Paris Agreement, world leaders agreed that climate change is driven by human behavior, that it poses a threat to the environment and all of humanity, and that global action is needed to stop it.
It also created a clear framework for all countries to make emission reduction commitments and strengthen these measures over time. Here are some key reasons why the agreement is so important: Recognizing that many developing countries and small island states that have contributed the least to climate change could suffer the most from its consequences, the Paris Agreement includes a plan for developed countries – and others ” that are “able to do so” – to continue providing financial resources. help developing countries mitigate climate change and increase their resilience. The agreement builds on financial commitments from the 2009 Copenhagen Accord, which aimed to increase public and private climate finance for developing countries to $100 billion a year by 2020. (To put this in perspective, global military spending in 2017 alone amounted to about $1.7 trillion, more than a third of which came from the United States.) The Copenhagen Pact also created the Green Climate Fund to support the mobilisation of transformation finance with targeted public funds. The Paris Agreement established hope that the world would set a higher annual target by 2025 to build on the $100 billion target for 2020 and put in place mechanisms to achieve that scale. Although the United States and Turkey are not party to the agreement because they have not declared their intention to withdraw from the 1992 UNFCCC, as Annex 1 countries of the UNFCCC, they will continue to be required to produce national communications and an annual greenhouse gas inventory. [91] The level of NDCs set by each country[8] will set that country`s objectives. However, the “contributions” themselves are not binding under international law because they do not have the specificity, normative character or mandatory language necessary to create binding norms.
[20] In addition, there will be no mechanism to force a country[7] to set a target in its NDC on a specific date and no application if a target set in an NDC is not met. [8] [21] There will be only one “Name and Shame” system,[22] or as János Pásztor, UN Under-Secretary-General for Climate Change, told CBS News (USA), a “Name and Encouragement” plan. [23] Given that the agreement does not foresee any consequences if countries do not comply with their obligations, such a consensus is fragile. A net of nations withdrawing from the deal could trigger the withdrawal of more governments and lead to a total collapse of the deal. [24] Both the EU and its Member States are individually responsible for ratifying the Paris Agreement. It has been reported that the EU and its 28 Member States deposit their instruments of ratification at the same time to ensure that neither the EU nor its Member States commit to commitments that belong strictly to each other[21], and there have been fears that disagreement over each Member State`s share of the EU-wide reduction target, as well as the British vote to leave the EU may delay the Paris Pact. [22] However, on 4 October 2016, the European Parliament approved the ratification of the Paris Agreement[23] and the EU deposited its instruments of ratification on 5 October 2016. October 2016 with several EU Member States.
[22] A new issue that emerged at the centre of the Paris negotiations[55] arose from the fact that many of the worst impacts of climate change will be too severe or too rapid to be avoided by adaptation measures. The Paris Agreement explicitly recognizes the need to remedy these losses and damages and aims to find appropriate responses. [56] It clarifies that loss and damage can take various forms, both as immediate effects of extreme weather events and as slow effects, such as. B land loss and sea level rise for low-lying islands. [33] As a contribution to the objectives of the agreement, countries submitted comprehensive national climate action plans (nationally defined contributions, NDCs). These are not yet sufficient to meet the agreed temperature targets, but the agreement points the way for further action. Paragraphs 6.4 to 6.7 establish a mechanism “to contribute to the control of greenhouse gases and support sustainable development”. [40] Although there is still no specific name for the mechanism, many Parties and observers have informally united around the name “Sustainable Development Mechanism” or “SW Award”.
[41] [42] The MSD is considered the successor to the Clean Development Mechanism, a flexible mechanism under the Kyoto Protocol through which Parties could jointly request emission reductions for their intended nationally determined contributions. The SDG provides the framework for the future of the Clean Development Mechanism after Kyoto (in 2020). [needs to be updated] INDCs become NDCs – Nationally Determined Contributions – once a country formally accedes to the agreement. There are no specific requirements on how countries should reduce their emissions or to what extent, but there have been political expectations regarding the nature and severity of the targets set by different countries. As a result, national plans vary considerably in scope and ambition, largely reflecting each country`s capacities, level of development and contribution to emissions over time. China, for example, has pledged to reduce its CO2 emissions by 2030 at the latest and to reduce CO2 emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) by 60 to 65 percent by 2030 compared to 2005 levels. India has set a target of reducing emissions intensity by 33-35% from 2005 levels by 2030 and producing 40% of its electricity from non-fossil sources. The general scientific opinion is that any increase in global temperatures of more than 2 degrees Celsius would be catastrophic for the Earth, causing severe natural disasters, a melted Arctic and possible mass extinctions. When the entire planet is in danger, it takes the whole world to fight climate change. The ultimate goal of the agreement is to limit the increase in global warming this century to 1.5 degrees Celsius. .
- On February 23, 2022
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