Comments: Unfair sharing of burdens, the rich countries are not doing enough? The big countries are trying to close a deal over the heads of the small countries?
The “West” is rich and the emission of CO2 pr. inhabitant is very high, say a factor of 15-20. Emissions are growing!
China is a big emitter and growing, but its emissions pr. inhabitant is only half, say factor 10, of the top emitters in the West.
The emission in poor countries has, say, a factor of 1. The poor wants to develop their economy to get rid of poverty, educate their people, and their emissions are also growing.
The poor countries, and China, India, Brazil now feel that they have to shoulder a bigger and unfair burden of emission cuts and that their future wellbeing is being jeopardized.
This has to be solved: An estimate for max. emission pr. inhabitant pr. country would be ideal, but conditions vary a lot so that this would be difficult to determine. Such a baseline could be used to determine the cuts in each country. Energy intensity or emission per unit of output is another measure.
A first step could be to find reliable emission numbers for countries based on their local conditions, establish a credible institution to monitor the figures, make a treaty where the establishment of a baseline for emissions pr. inhabitant over time is agreed upon, set emission numbers for all countries, build systematic procedures to control emissions including tools like quota trade, incentives and taxes, change the energy use away from the burning of carbon fuels, introducing monitor-and-reduce regimes for all big emitters.
The rich countries with the big emissions pr. inhabitant are the crooks in the game: They are the main perpetrators and have surely to carry the main burden of solving the problem. But change can be costly and may reduce their industrial capacity.
A sort of international tax for countries with high emissions pr. inhabitant could be used to finance the development of a programme.
And what happens in the real world? The main obstacle may be American internal politics!
The transition to a low-carbon future can promote a new era of economic wellbeing that includes most countries, help us toward global equality and international co-operation on a new scale. And it may save the world.
Tags: baseline, emission control, pr. inhabitant