Such a commitment will give signals breaking the inertia of ‘business as usual’ and triggering the development and diffusion of new practices, standards, technologies and consumption patterns. Such a result will start to steer the world economy towards a sustainable future.

The Kyoto Conference had a wide range of proposals on targets and timetables for legally binding reduction for the developed nations over the next two or three decades. The main proposals negotiated are given in the box below.

Other issues for the Kyoto negotiations were:

The underlying essence of the entire negotiation in Kyoto was the need for a political will to reach an understanding and agreement on commitments that will lead the process towards achieving the objective of the Convention - stabilisation of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.

The G-77 and China, at every opportunity of the 10-day debate, totally rejected the idea of developing countries accepting any form of greenhouse gas reduction target until and unless these countries’ main agenda - poverty eradication was fully addressed and met. In support of the developing countries stand, Chairman Raul Estrada (AGBM and Committee of the Whole of COP3) made a powerful plea on various occasions that between 1987 and 1993 non-Annex 1 parties as a group recorded a greater average reduction in energy intensity per unit GDP than did Annex 1 parties. At the same time, the biggest economy in the world had a growth in emission equal to their growth in GDP during 1996.

The F-gases -HFCs, PFCs and SF6 are of concern because they have a high global warming potential (GWP) and long atmospheric residence time. HFCs are gases containing only hydrogen, carbon and fluorine, PFCs are gases containing only carbon and fluorine. Current and expected application areas of HFCs and PFCs include refrigeration and air conditioning, fire suppression and explosion protection, aerosols, foam blowing and other applications such as sterilisation equipment. The primary uses of SF6 include gas insulated switch gear and other applications such as insulating medium, a tracer, in leak detectors and in various electronic applications. SF6 is a particularly potent greenhouse gas with a 100-year GWP of 23,900 and an estimated lifetime of about 3,200 years. The GWP of some of the other F gases are: HFC-134a: 1300, HFC-125:2800: HFC-23:11700, HFC-152a: 140, perfluoro-ethane: 9200, perfluoromethane: 6500 times of CO2 (GWP of CO2 is taken as 1).

The consumption of F-gases has increased considerably in industrialised countries with the phasing out of the chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).It is difficult to accurately measure the emissions of the F-gases, more so, since in many applications, the F-gases are locked in the equipment for a considerable period before they are emitted into the atmosphere. The protocol is silent on the issue of whether the potential emissions or actual emissions of these F-gases should be taken into account during the commitment period 2008-2012 by the Annex I parties.

Some argued that these F-gases could add as much as 10 per cent to industrialised country emissions by 2010 and it was important that all the six gases viz., CO2, CH4, N2O, HFCs, PFCs and SF6 should be covered under the protocol in COP3 itself. To miss this opportunity would undermine the entire credibility of the protocol.

The main features of the protocol signed at Kyoto on December 10, 1997 are:

The Kyoto Protocol established a Clean Development Mechanism to assist developing country parties in achieving sustainable development and in contributing to the ultimate objective of the Convention and to assist Annex I parties in achieving compliance with their quantified emission limitation and reduction commitments under Article 3 of the protocol.

In view of this Article it is necessary to constitute a number of task forces by the Government of India to initiate country programmes in these areas of economic activities with a view to mitigate and adapt to climate change, and for initiating various scientific and technological R&D programmes to reduce uncertainties related to climate change, the adverse impacts of climate change and economic and social consequences of various response strategies and promote endogenous capacities and capabilities including development and implementation of education and training programmes (Article 10.e).
 

Though the 10-day conference exposed a world divided by wealth and economic priorities, the response from the citizen groups of the world, youth, religious leaders and business was unprecedented. There was an amazing unanimity in terms of the goal that we must leave behind for posterity the legacy of a better world.  q