Kyoto Agreement

In December 1997, the first of many meetings took place in the city of Kyoto, Japan. Most of the world's leaders were drawn there to discuss the environmental crisis. Their aim was to reduce and stabilize greenhouse gasses in our atmosphere. Over a span of about ten years, 192 countries and one major company agreed to do their part.

The meetings at Kyoto were very complex but the one thing almost everyone agreed on was that we were causing global warming through our pollution. Out of the 193 countries that eventually took part, 37 of them were set legally binding goals for future greenhouse gasses emissions. Some (mainly developing countries) were allowed to increase their emissions, but most countries, especially developed, were given goals to decrease by 2012. The difference with the other 156 parties was that they were only encouraged to be greener. All 37 countries that participated in the protocol where officially monitored to see if they were within the boundaries of their own set goal.

Below is a chart highlighting the greenhouse gasses emissions expectations and actual numbers of 35 out of the 37 countries that were given targets.

 

Image from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyoto_Protocol

As you can see, the goals can be considered anything but similar. They range from +10% to -8%. The counties that were granted an increase are Iceland, Norway, and Australia. There are also countries outside of this list that didn't agree to accepting a set target, or even agree to trying to decrease their emissions. These countries are considered undecided.

Participation in the Kyoto Protocol, as of December 2010

Image from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyoto_Protocol

Green = Countries that have signed and ratified the treaty
             (countries with set targets are in dark green)
Grey = Countries that have not yet decided

Brown = No intention to ratify at this stage.

It is clear that the majority of the world is in favour of Kyoto, as you can see by the map above. But, you might be asking "Why is the United States showed in brown?". Well, it is because they have publicly announced that they have no intention of  fulfilling their duty. This is very surprising to most people because you would assume that a modern country like the US, filled to the brim with environmentalists, would actually care about an issue as indescribably huge as this one. It gets worse. As of August 2011, Canada is officially in the same position.

As a Canadian myself, I find it disgraceful that the Harper government would agree to this. You might call me harsh, by looking at the chart you could see that Canada wasn't headed in the right direction from the start. And the conference in Durban was also only 2 months away. Most would consider it a temporary move, but coming from a country that has always strived for efficiency and reducing pollution, it is still hard to take.

This leads me to my next point, has the Canadian government actually done anything worth mentioning to reduce greenhouse gasses? Well, if it's not already clear, the answer is no. Take a look at this diagram.

Map of Canada showing the increases in GHG emissions by province/territory in 2008, compared to the 1990 base year 

Image from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_and_the_Kyoto_Protocol

  50%+ increase

  30%–50% increase

  20%–30% increase

  10%–20% increase

  0%–10% increase

  0%–10% decrease

  Each square represents 2 tonnes CO₂ eq. per capita

Congratulations Quebec and PEI, as you the only provinces in Canada that reduced your greenhouse gasses emissions. As for Canada as a whole, in 2006 it was 29% higher then it should of been according to Kyoto.

I'm sure Canada had a very good reason(s) to abort the set target. Even I believe that Kyoto wasn't completely fair. Forcing a country to lower their pollution is a major thing. It affects jobs, and the economy in general for the simple reason that to get money from mining (Canada's main source of income), you have to pollute. Allowing Australia to increase emissions by 10% will still hurt their economy. The reason that they are allowed to increase is because they are the biggest polluter in the world. Australia would love to double their emissions  if they could. Their target is still reasonable but it just won't hurt them as bad as, for example, Canada. Another unfair aspect of Kyoto is that 81% of counties that participated basically got of with a warning. That doesn't mean that they shouldn't make an effort. It just means that they won't stress about damaging their economy as much as someone who agreed to lowering their emissions by 8% in order to be fair to the world. Although, I think it's safe to say that you wouldn't have much of an economy if you don't have a habitable planet to put it on.

The faith of the world is resting in the hands of a few politicians gathered in Africa right now. The first term of the Kyoto "treaty" is going to end in 2012 and the world gathered to try to come to a new agreement. Whatever they decide on I just hope that it will be fair and that it will last a lot longer the the previous agreement. Just don't get too excited, since the conference is running out of time and leaders are scheduled to return to their home country, it will almost certainly be put off for a minimum of another precious year that we don't have. Maybe it will be enough time for them to realize that if they don't come to a consensus soon, it will be too late.


Sources:


http://www.kyotoprotocol.com/
http://unfccc.int/kyoto_protocol/items/2830.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Kyoto_Protocol_signatories
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyoto_Protocol
http://unfccc.int/2860.php