Lots of “Hot Air” from Sweden and others

Sweden, where we are staying, along with Finland and Austria were one of the first groups to receive the very prestigious “Fossil of the Day Award”, which is awarded to the country or group that makes the worst climate decision at the day’s meetings.

http://www.fossiloftheday.com/

At first I was shocked that these Nordic countries received an award before even the US. I had been riding around on Sweden’s fantastic train system and walking through towns filled with bikers thinking how nice it would be if the US could be this green. But when I looked into it, it all made sense. It all comes down to land use, which has turned out to be the highlight, and the pitfall, of negotiations so far.

Managing land use is the quickest and one of the most effective ways to reduce emissions, particularly in the short term. It also happens to be one of the most difficult things to measure. It took me a little while to figure out for myself just what was going on because some of the methodology is very complicated, but I tried to simplify it as much as possible for this blog. I know many people reading this blog are busy, but I would like to plead to you to take the time to fully understand the issues at hand, because they are much more complex than they seem. The public likes to have definitive numbers and statements that they can quote, but it is dangerous to oversimplify. I had the misfortune of listening to several excellent presentations by some of the leading researchers in the field of climate modeling, only to come to the Q and A section and hear the reporters in the room ask nothing but questions about the recent email hacker scandal. I was incredibly frustrated, and I could tell the scientist on the panel were very annoyed that these reporters would waste their time giving attention to a subject that, if they really understood it, they would realize has almost no importance. I will stop ranting now, but first must encourage you to take time to understand the issues presented here. Ask me questions if something doesn’t make sense, and don’t just take my word for it, go out and find a real, accountable source.

In order to calculate reductions you have to know what you are subtracting from. There are two basic methods for calculating a baseline for reductions; historical levels, or projected levels. Historical baselines are taken from the trends of previous years. Right now most countries are calculating their targets as some percentage below 1990 levels. Baselines can also be calculated using projected, future emission levels. CO2 emissions would be predicted using a “business as usual” scenario, and any emissions below the projected increase would be credited as a reduction.

But predicting the future is risky business. A country’s future emissions can be impacted by a whole host of unforeseeable events, such an economic recession. So consider for a moment what would happen if the predictions of future emissions turned out to be too high. Basically, it amounts to handing out free extra carbon credits. Nations could do absolutely nothing, nothing more than “business as usual”, and be credited for reductions! They could even increase emissions and be credited for reductions! Even if the predictions are completely accurate nations would still be increasing emissions, just not at the frenzied pace they predicted, and thus being credited for increases.

The term for this loophole is “Hot Air”, because the credits don’t represent any real work, and are thus just a lot of hot air. What’s worse is if a carbon trading system is set up nations with a lot of “Hot Air” could sell it as carbon credits to countries trying to reach their reduction goals, thus making the reduction promises of developed nations just a lot of hot air.

Sweden, Finland and Austria have backed an EU proposal that would allow credits for preventing deforestation to be allocated based on projected levels of logging. Basically this means that they could continue to log their forests, emitting GHG’s and destroying carbon sinks, and still be credited for reducing emissions. Sweden, Finland and Austria have significant standing forests and could reap some very significant financial benifits from this deal. They were awarded a second place “Fossil of the Day Award” for attempting to convince the rest of the world to pay them for cutting down trees.