The UN climate convention conference that just wrapped up in Lima was meant to deliver a draft for a new universal climate agreement to be inked in Paris, France next year and to come into effect in 2020. Before the meeting, hopes were officially high:
All eyes will now be on Lima where the key litmus test of engagement and ambition will be the emergence of a concise and credible draft agreement to be further refined in 2015
Despite the overtime negotiations, that key litmus test was not met.
Amid justifiable disappointment and cynicism about the lack of progress in international climate negotiations, it is worth taking another look at the four key messages in the Environmental Commissioner of Ontario's July 2014 report "Looking for Leadership: the Costs of Climate Inaction".
Commissioner Miller's key messages centred around "Four Big Ideas".
"First, the science is certain. No longer do we talk about when climate change will happen. It is happening now.
Second, there is carbon we need to leave in the ground. We call this "unburnable carbon". Of the proven reserves, we need to leave 2/3 of it in the ground to stay under the temperature increase of 2 degrees Celsius. We have only 1000 Gt left we can burn if we agree on this temperature increase as a way to maintain the relatively stable climate conditions that humans (and other species) had adapted to over the previous 12,000 years; and to prevent some of the worst impacts of climate-change-driven drought, heat waves, and sea-level rise. Even this limit is considered questionable.
Third, insurance pricing and availability will change. The insurance industry for some time has been concerned about the impacts of climate change. With the frequency of catastrophic events increasing, risks previously insured will no longer be insurable. This will have a huge impact at both individual and social levels. We've blogged about this before.
Fourth, the adaptation/mitigation framework has changed. We used to talk about mitigating to avoid adaptation. But this is not possible anymore. We will have to mitigate to make it possible to adapt at all."
Harper's Canada remains an international climate bad actor, but many other countries contributed to the failure of this year's talks. What disasters will it take before we take the climate crisis seriously?
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