We’ve been here before. On 28 June 1997, The Guardian in the U.K. \nannounced: “EARTH SUMMIT ENDS IN FAILURE”. Six months later, on 12 \nDecember, it ran a related story: “KYOTO DEAL LEAVES U.S. FREE TO \nPOLLUTE”. On 16 November this year, after only three days of talks at \nThe Hague, came the headline we well could have anticipated: “CLIMATIC \nTALKS STALEMATE AS E.U. REJECTS U.S.A. FOREST PLAN”.The current round of\n talks in The Hague are about reviewing progress since the December 1997\n agreement which set targets for industrialised countries for cuts in \ngreenhouse gas emissions. The problem now is over the issue of \nloopholes-well anticipated at Kyoto-which allow countries to avoid \ncutting back on carbon emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Whilst the European Union (E.U.) insists that countries should in the\n first instance cut back on fossil fuels, there is an umbrella group of \ncountries-the U.S.A., Japan, Canada, New Zealand and Australia-which \nbelieve in alternative methods of “reducing” carbon dioxide emissions. \nThe latter are taking the “flexibility mechanism”, allowed under the \nKyoto Protocol, to new extremes. Instead of cutting their fossil fuel \n(carbon) emissions they buy carbon credits from countries that are not \nlikely to exceed their carbon emission quota as laid down at Kyoto and \nthus continue to pollute as before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As the quotas are based on 1990 levels of emissions, countries, for \ninstance of the former USSR which since 1990 have seen a drastic \nreduction in heavy industry, are selling their unused entitlements to \nthe U.S.A.. In this respect even ethical Britain is just as guilty of \ncarbon trading as those countries it criticises, with the UK hoping to \nsell carbon dioxide it would have produced were the coal mines not \nclosed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Whilst the E.U. insists the U.S.A. must make at least half of its \nreduction from genuine energy cutbacks at home, the U.S.A. is adamant \nthat the loopholes it exploits must remain in place before it is \nprepared to sign up to any agreement to curb emissions. As well as the \ncarbon trading loophole, there are indeed other loopholes and dodges the\n U.S.A. and others are taking advantage of, such as “carbon sinks”. As \nforests absorb carbon from the atmosphere, the U.S.A. and other \ncountries, now plant and indeed buy forests, at home and in other \ncountries, and count the carbon this is estimated to save against their \nown emissions. This is already proving a lucrative business. One \nMalaysian logging firm is presently replacing the forests it depletes \nwith new plantations and selling pollution permits to the U.S.A.. \nAnother loophole is to be found with countries paying for a project in a\n lesser developed country, with the aim of reducing carbon and counting \nit against their own emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You name the dodge and the profit-greedy have thought of it. This \nincludes feeding cattle, pigs and sheep new diets that help reduce the \namount of methane they emit when they pass wind and pumping carbon \ndioxide into the ocean to be absorbed by the seas and sprinkling iron \nfilings across the surface of the ocean to stimulate plankton growth \n(then calculate how much plankton dies and sinks to the bottom of the \nseam, taking the carbon with them, and claim credit for it).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The perennial problem is that countries are reluctant to promote the \ninvestment in more environmentally friendly methods of production and \ntransport because their respective governments, being the executive arm \nof the capitalist class, prefer to bow with suppliant knee to powerful \noil, coal, iron and steel lobbies, rather than openly acknowledge that \necologically we risk approaching the point of no return.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When we consider that at Kyoto, it was announced that a global 60 \npercent reduction in carbon emissions was necessary to maintain a stable\n climate, with the U.S.A. asked to reduce their emissions by 7 percent \nof 1990 levels (which would mean a 34 percent reduction now), and that \nthe U.S.A., with 4 percent of the world’s population is currently \nresponsible for 24 percent of global carbon emissions, we get some idea \nof the pathos of the whole issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In spite of all the evidence that suggests that deforestation and \npresent production and transport methods are primary responsible for \nclimatic warming-the disappearing polar icecaps, global flooding, rising\n sea levels, vegetation dieback, the loss of thousands of species of \nlife, and that the speed and scale of global warming has no \nprecedent-the world’s governments still insist these wasteful, though \nprofit-generating methods must remain. And this in spite of recent \nevidence from the hundreds of scientists that inform the \nIntergovernmental Panel on Climatic Change that suggests the atmosphere \nwill warm at twice the rate predicted ten years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At the Rio Summit in 1992, at the Earth Summit in New York in June 1997 and at the Earth II Summit in Kyoto, Japan, six months later-all at which carbon emissions were the core issue-the delegates fought and bickered over deals that would best suit their respective paymasters, their countries reneging on the agreements they signed up to. We can well expect this current round of talks to be another waste of time whilst providing us with further evidence that capitalism has long outlived its usefulness and that it is time to hand over control of the world to those who could best decide its future-a global socialist majority. That companies can get exited about the profits to be made from trading in pollution credits-whilst the planet we inhabit faces environmental catastrophe from pollution-says much about the insanity of the system we live in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n