UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has something to be proud of as his term comes to a close – the Paris Agreement takes effect on November 4, 2016. This will occur 30 days after the protocol was ratified by at least 55 countries that produce at least 55 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. It took less than a year to do so. By comparison, the Kyoto Protocol, the Paris Agreement’s predecessor, was signed in 1997 but came into force as late as 2005.
As of October 5, 73 countries and the EU as a regional organization were parties to the Paris Agreement. Among the countries that have ratified the protocol are such major “producers” of emissions as the US, China, and India. Ukraine was one of the first in Europe to ratify the agreement – President Petro Poroshenko approved a resolution to this effect on August 1.
“The fact that the Paris Agreement was signed in less than a year shows that there is a political will in the world to resist global climate changes. This is going to speed up the already ongoing processes,” says Iryna Stavchuk, an expert in climate changes at the National Ecological Center of Ukraine.
The next step is to formulate the rules of carrying out the agreement. The process will begin at 22nd Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change on November 7 to 18 in Marrakesh, Morocco. Ukraine’s Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources, Ostap Semerak, said recently in a 112 Ukraine TV channel program: the fact that we were among the first to ratify the protocol gives us a priority right to influence the formulation of new rules.
“As the Minister of Ecology, I will attend the conference of the parties as part of the Ukrainian delegation. We will be working on the establishment of these procedures. I hope the world will accept our ministry’s proposals, and we will be not only among the first to ratify the Paris Agreement, but also among the leading countries that will influence decision-making in the future,” Semerak said optimistically in the abovementioned program.
Stavchuk hopes that Ukraine’s opinion will be of special significance in the formulation of Paris Agreement rules, but it is important in this context who will represent Ukraine at international climate forums. “At the Marrakesh conference, Ukraine stands a good chance to participate in some working groups and governing bodies. But a lot depends on whether the Ukrainian delegation will be able to offer people who will work adequately and be accepted by other countries. The point is that the composition of our delegation was continuously changing for a long time, which is bad for climate negotiations. It takes several years to come to know what is going on in this sphere, and a lot is based on human contacts, links, and understanding. Ukraine loses out on this matter: once people know their way around, they are suddenly transferred somewhere else, and other people attend climate meetings. The state should pursue a more stable policy in this matter,” Stavchuk says.
What can be called a certain contribution to resisting climate change are the two laws the Verkhovna Rada passed on October 4: No. 3259 “On Strategic Ecological Assessment” and No. 2009a-d “On Assessing Impact on the Environment.” “The law on assessing the impact on the environment will be influencing the climatic situation because when new fossil-fuel power stations or other facilities are being built, more attention will be paid to their impact on the environment,” Stavchuk says. “But these laws are important not only for climate change, but also for Ukraine as a whole. A lot of industrial facilities are being built, but there were no clear-cut, European-style, regulations earlier to assess the impact on the environment. We waited for this kind of law for a long time and held a lot of campaigns, but MPs were very reluctant to pass one because it toughens the procedure of environmental expert examination before the construction of industrial facilities.”
The Paris protocol’s entry into force is not just the signing of papers by MPs, it is “a testament to the urgency for action, and reflects the consensus of governments that robust global cooperation … is essential to meet the climate challenge,” as Ban Ki-moon stressed. In Stavchuk’s words, if the US and China had not reached certain accords while the agreement was being adopted, this would have much complicated the ratification process. The agreement might have not be able to enter into force for years because it is impossible to achieve the 55-percent threshold of emissions unless the document is ratified by China or the United States.
Most of the countries that produce a large number of emissions have agreed to resist climate changes within the framework of the Paris protocol. One of the exceptions is Russia. “The point is not that they had no time to do this. The country has held some campaigns and spread information that it was not in Russia’s interests to ratify the Paris Agreement. That country is taking rather a dim view of the protocol,” Stavchuk adds. “Russia is rich in hydrocarbons, such as oil, gas, and coal. They are the backbone of its economy, and renewable sources of energy are practically not being developed there. When the Kyoto Protocol was being adopted, they were holding a campaign that claimed that there were no climate changes and that it was just a natural process. They still do not seem to understand that the era of fossil fuels is coming to an end and, to be competitive in the world, one must revise its strategic energy plans and build the economy on different approaches.”
One way or another, the UN secretary general is urgings all the parties to the Framework Convention to ratify the Paris Agreement. And those who have already done so are thinking about the Marrakesh forum, where the protocol will assume clearer outlines.
The Day’s FACT FILE
The Paris Agreement is part of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), aimed at streamlining measures to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide from 2020 onwards. The agreement’s text was approved at the 21st Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC in December 2015 in Paris. The main goal of the agreement is to keep global warming at the level of +2 Celsius and increase the ability of countries to adapt to the negative impacts of climate change.
