You need the major emitters on board
Christopher Brooker writes in The Telegraph:
China, now easily the world’s largest emitter, contributing 24 per cent of the total, plans by 2030 to double its CO2 emissions, not least by building 363 more coal-fired power stations. India, now the third-largest emitter, plans by 2030 to treble its emissions. The fourth-largest emitter, Russia, despite slashing its emissions after 1990 by closing down much of its old Soviet industry, now proposes to increase them from their 2012 level by up to 38 per cent.
Which makes a mockery of anything the rest of the world does.
If you want a binding agreement on climate change, you need to get the top 10 emitters to agree on a cap. If they can all agree, then the rest of the world will probably follow.
But if China, India and Russia are all saying they’ll massively increase emissions, then any impact of emissions reductions from the rest of the world is an expensive waste of money.
Here’s the top 10 emitters:
- China 22.7%
- US 15.6%
- EU28 10.9%
- India 5.7%
- Russia 5.4%
- Japan 2.9%
- Brazil 2.6%
- Indonesia 1.9%
- Canada 1.7%
- Iran 1.6%
Those 10 represent around 72% of global emissions. Again whatever they agree to, I am sure countries like New Zealand, Tanzania and Singapore who are around 0.2% each will match them.