date: Fri May 9 17:55:50 2003 from: Mike Hulme subject: Fwd: RE: Climate Equities: please see attached items (the covering to: n.adger Neil, Some interesting contributions from Pete Betts at the Treasury, Mike From: "Betts, Peter" To: 'John Ashton' , "Kate Hampton (GA) (E-mail)" , "Kiyo Akasaka (E-mail)" , "Benito Mueller (E-mail)" , "Nick Mabey (office) (E-mail)" , "Tom Burke (Rio) (E-mail)" , "Richard Macrory (E-mail)" , "Nancy Kete (E-mail)" , "John Topping (E-mail)" , "John Lennox (E-mail)" , "John Beale (E-mail)" , "Justin Mundy (E-mail)" , "James Cameron (E-mail)" , "Mike Mason (E-mail)" , "Rajendra Pachauri (E-mail)" , "Iain Orr (E-mail)" , "Michael J Grubb (E-mail)" , "Alex Evans (E-mail)" , "Mike Hulme (E-mail)" , "Duncan Brack (E-mail)" , "Geoff Jenkins (E-mail)" , "Betts, Peter" , "Peter Unwin (E-mail)" , "Calestous_Juma (E-mail)" , "Crispin Tickell (E-mail)" , "Dan Esty (E-mail)" , "David Fisk (E-mail)" , "Derek Osborn (E-mail)" , "James Lowen (E-mail)" , "Jennifer Morgan (E-mail)" , "Jeremy. Leggett (E-mail)" , "Kirsty Hamilton (E-mail)" , "Lilia Abron (E-mail)" , "Malini Mehra (E-mail)" , "'Michael Northrop' (E-mail)" , "Richard Sandbrook (E-mail)" , "Tom Roper (E-mail)" , "Zen A Makuch (E-mail)" Cc: "Elliot Diringer (E-mail)" , "Dan Bodansky (E-mail) (E-mail)" , "Xueman Wang (E-mail) (E-mail)" Subject: RE: Climate Equities: please see attached items (the covering let ter is "equitycommentsltr": open that first) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 09:59:39 +0100 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2653.19) Dear John (and Xueman) Many thanks for the opportunity to comment. Can I offer some prosaic thoughts? I agree with your two main conclusions: - That any attempt to define equity, or to agree a very detailed approach on the basis of it, is bound to fail and risks diverting negotiating energy from more productive terrain; and - that any lasting agreement will have to be seen as equitable by all (or nearly all) Parties If your paper can use informal contacts to push towards consensus on that, it will have performed a valuable role. Put simply: developed countries will need to act first and make the biggest contribution; the key developing countries will then progressively need to be brought within the system. There will need to be transfers to developing countries to assist them with adaptation in particular. But at the heart of a deal that makes a difference will be big cuts by some (relatively few) emitters. Voluntary cuts in standard of living are unlikely however. So we need to drive technology. That means putting a price on Carbon All of that is commonplace. But the equity debate in the negotiations is almost never about that. How is it raised?: i) most commonly in terms of the process with (mostly) developing country representatives feeling excluded by the complexity and bounced by the big players, or OPEC telling us they are. You address this by suggesting a need for greater capacity building of delegates. But this will not change the fundamentals: a workable climate regime will need a lot of detailed rules mostly worked up by specialists: key developed countries will not be in the room on everything. We need to separate the technical from the political. (If I wanted to be more controversial I would add that any political deal that will make a difference will be done by a very small group of people in a small room. Of course there will need to be processes for progressively bringing in others; but unless we recognise that fact of life we will not be serving the needs of future generations); ii) the next most common context is that no deal is acceptable unless it shows parallel progress on all issues, including OPEC issues. This gives OPEC big leverage. Clearly adaptation and technology transfer are much more worthy causes; but does it really make sense for deals on emissions cuts by developed countries to be held up by developing countries unless they get progress on all issues at every meeting? iii) The other common context is opposition to the Kyoto mechanisms (in themselves key to setting a global price for Carbon) on the basis that they amount to permanent ownership rights. Is it naive to think your paper could help to reassure people on that? Your paper hints at the weaknesses in the process (eg future generations are not present in the negotiating room) but arguably process is worth a paper on its own in Pew s batch for COP9. Two points of detail: i) in Section 5.2, you describe the flexibilities of the Kyoto Protocol. You do not mention what is arguably the biggest: that the setting of overall limits other than (say) technology requirements enables Parties to decide where to focus their reduction efforts; ii) in Section 5.8, you raise an idea from Tom Burke that we might score Carbon emissions at the point of consumption rather than production. I can see where this is coming form, but it risks creating a new source of complexity in the negotiations. Once we have established a market price for carbon won't that be reflected in the price of the product? Won t it be for producers of energy intensive goods to make their case for this to be reflected in their emission limits? Pete -----Original Message----- From: John Ashton [[1]mailto:john@lead.org] Sent: 14 April 2003 17:23 To: Kate Hampton (GA) (E-mail); Kiyo Akasaka (E-mail); Benito Mueller (E-mail); Nick Mabey (office) (E-mail); Tom Burke (Rio) (E-mail); Richard Macrory (E-mail); Nancy Kete (E-mail); John Topping (E-mail); John Lennox (E-mail); John Beale (E-mail); Justin Mundy (E-mail); James Cameron (E-mail); Mike Mason (E-mail); Rajendra Pachauri (E-mail); Iain Orr (E-mail); Michael J Grubb (E-mail); Alex Evans (E-mail); Mike Hulme (E-mail); Duncan Brack (E-mail); Geoff Jenkins (E-mail); Peter Betts (E-mail); Peter Unwin (E-mail); Calestous_Juma (E-mail); Crispin Tickell (E-mail); Dan Esty (E-mail); David Fisk (E-mail); Derek Osborn (E-mail); James Lowen (E-mail); Jennifer Morgan (E-mail); Jeremy. Leggett (E-mail); Kirsty Hamilton (E-mail); Lilia Abron (E-mail); Malini Mehra (E-mail); 'Michael Northrop' (E-mail); Richard Sandbrook (E-mail); Tom Roper (E-mail); Zen A Makuch (E-mail) Cc: Elliot Diringer (E-mail); Dan Bodansky (E-mail) (E-mail); Xueman Wang (E-mail) (E-mail) Subject: Climate Equities: please see attached items (the covering letter is "equitycommentsltr": open that first) <> <> <> PLEASE NOTE: THE ABOVE MESSAGE WAS RECEIVED FROM THE INTERNET. On entering the GSI, this email was scanned for viruses by the Government Secure Intranet (GSI) virus scanning service supplied exclusively by Cable & Wireless in partnership with MessageLabs. GSI users see [2]http://www.gsi.gov.uk/main/new2002notices.htm for further details. In case of problems, please call your organisational IT helpdesk. ********************************************************************** If you have received this email and it was not intended for you, please let us know, and then delete it. 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