Developed and developing countries continue to haggle over terms of a new pact to limit global warming gases. With only 15 full negotiating days scheduled before the Copenhagen climate change summit at the end of the year, the next round of talks in Bangkok from September 28 to October 9 loom as a make-or-break effort.
On two key issues, the parties are poles apart. The panel of scientists and officials advising the UN on climate change says industrialised countries need to take the lead by agreeing to cut emissions by as much as 40 per cent by 2020. So far, pledges from advanced economies are far below these levels.
Meanwhile, their offers of money and technology to help developing countries reduce emissions and adapt to climate change are a long way short of the UN target. Perhaps a high-level climate conference being convened by the UN in New York shortly before the Bangkok meeting will help bridge the negotiating gaps.
Two recent findings underscore the need for action. In 2007, the UN advisory panel, known as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), put the global costs of adapting to climate change at between US$40 billion and US$170 billion a year. In a report on August 27, a group of scientists concluded that the real costs were likely to be two or three times greater.
Their report warns that the current estimates being used as a basis for the UN-sponsored climate negotiations do not include key economic sectors such as energy, manufacturing, retailing, mining, tourism and ecosystems. These scientists should know. Among them is Professor Martin Parry, now at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College in London, which published the report with the International Institute for Environment and Development. Until last year, Parry co-chaired the IPCC's working group responsible for assessing climate change impacts, vulnerability and adaptation.
If the cost of adapting to a warmer world and more extreme weather is much greater than first thought, it will make contentious negotiations more difficult. Finance is one of the keys to an effective deal in Copenhagen. But, with advanced economies anxious about the burden of rising debt and slow recovery from recession, they are unlikely to be in a generous mood.