Vol. 72/No. 1      January 7, 2008

Emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases gradually raise the temperature of the earth’s atmosphere over the long term. In 1997, officials of the major industrialized countries met in Kyoto, Japan, and pledged that by the year 2012 they would cut greenhouse gases by 5 percent below 1990 levels.

The heart of the Kyoto treaty, however, is the “cap and trade” scheme that lets the owners of industry and agribusiness evade emissions standards and allows governments that reduce emissions below the cap to sell the difference to others as an unused “right” to pollute. In Europe, for example, caps were set so high that in 2006 many European Union (EU) governments ended up with “excess” carbon credits, which they sold as a commodity on the world market.

Both Kyoto and the latest negotiations were marked by the economic competition between capitalist governments. In 2001, U.S. president George Bush refused to ratify the Kyoto agreement, claiming that the added costs of adopting emissions reduction standards would hobble U.S. companies. Bush also criticized the pact for setting reductions only for the advanced capitalist countries. He singled out China and India as nations that should face controls.  
 
Carbon trading: lucrative market
The EU powers, with lower per capita emissions than the United States, accepted the Kyoto Protocol. They also developed a greenhouse gas emissions trading exchange. Carbon trading in 2008 is expected to be $70 billion, more than double the trade in 2006.

Kyoto adherents at the Bali conference, “particularly European countries, were eager to start the process of setting new limits to sustain the market in emissions credits—a keystone of the protocol,” the New York Times pointed out December 16.

EU delegates condemned Washington for not signing on to Kyoto and branded their U.S. rival as the main source of the world’s environmental problems.

In his speech in Bali, former U.S. vice president Albert Gore scored points against the Bush White House, declaring, “My own country, the United States, is principally responsible for obstructing progress here.” He suggested a new Democratic administration would back emissions caps. Gore’s position has won support from General Electric, Chevron, and other U.S. companies seeking to cash in on “a potential $300 billion U.S. market for such pollution permits,” Bloomberg News noted December 3.

A frenzied tone was adopted by many speakers at the Bali meeting. “The situation is so desperately serious that any delay could push us past the tipping point, beyond which the ecological, financial, and human costs would increase dramatically,” stated UN secretary general Ban Ki-Moon. Gore claimed the entire north polar ice cap “could completely disappear in as little as five to seven years.”

Kevin Watkins, director of the UN Human Development Report Office, expressed the view that the semicolonial world is the biggest threat to the environment, because of its size and its need to develop industrially. He wrote in the December 14 Guardian, “About 70% of the carbon surge over the next 25 years will originate in developing countries—most of it in India and China. From a climate change perspective, Asia has three critical ingredients that add up to crisis: high growth, large populations, and an energy system fuelled by large reserves of coal.”

Some delegates from semicolonial countries were suspicious of an offer by imperialist governments to establish a Reduced Emissions from Deforestation in Developing Countries (REDD) plan. The REDD would reward governments with carbon credits if they introduce programs to combat deforestation.

“There is concern about the developed world stealing our forests,” Fiu Elisana Mata’ese, head of the Samoan group O’le Siosiomaga Society, told the Reuters news agency. “This is an attempt to globally own the resources that are ours. We are concerned indigenous people who have managed forests for generations will not have a say in how they are run.”  
 
Professed concern for poor nations
Appealing for support in their fight against the U.S. government, EU delegates professed concern about the differential effects of climate change on the most underdeveloped nations. An “Adaptation Fund” was proposed to aid countries stricken by drought or flooding attributed to global warming. It consisted of a mere $36 million.

Washington campaigned hard at the conference for emissions reductions goals to be set for China and India, but was unsuccessful by the end of the conference.

A resolution backed by delegates from the EU and many semicolonial countries initially called on the most industrialized countries to reduce emissions by 25 to 40 percent by the year 2020. Washington, along with Ottawa and Tokyo, stood firm in rejecting any concrete goal. The final resolution omitted mention of specific goals, stating instead that “deep cuts in global emissions will be required.” The resolution is not binding on any government.

The government of Australia, which under the Liberal administration had opposed Kyoto, ratified it after the election of Labor prime minister Kevin Rudd. The Sydney Morning Herald noted that “by not ratifying Kyoto, Australia was estimated to be missing out on $3.8 billion of economic activity a year” such as futures trading in carbon credits.

Wall Street announced December 12 that it, too, is getting in on the profits to be made in the antiglobal warming business. Nymex Holdings and a group of Wall Street trading houses plan to start up the Green Exchange, which will offer environmental futures, options, and swaps contracts.
 
 
Related articles:
The capitalist ravaging of nature  
 
 
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