At Climate Talks in Lima, Only the Arguing Remains the Same - by James Fahn

The modest goal for the Paris agreement next year is to have each country offer up what it can, based on its current actions and plans, through “intended nationally determined commitments” (or INDCs, to use the latest acronym to sweep the COP).  This is the “bottom up” or “soft” approach described by Andrew Revkin at the start of the summit, although the combined commitments almost certainly won’t be enough to keep the planet below the politically agreed target of 2 degrees Celsius average warming.

Much of the debate in Lima centered on what countries should include in their INDCs; how long should the commitments be for; should the commitments include financing and adaptation goals; and that old chestnut:  how should the commitments of developed and developing countries be differentiated.

“We stand behind the differentiation,” said Antonio Marcondes of the Brazilian delegation, that proposed this could now take the form of concentric circles of responsibility, rather than the heretofore division between Annex I (developed) and Annex II (developing) countries.  “We stand behind "common but differentiated responsibilities" - these are issues we hold very strong and these are definite red lines,” he said.

Speaking at the Negotiator Media Clinic, an annual event organized by the Climate Change Media Partnership, which gathers together key negotiators from multiple delegations to sit down together and, an all too rare occurrence, respond to journalists’ questions; Elina Bardram, a leader of the European Union delegation, said they respected the principle of differentiation, but that “going into the future we need to apply that principle in a contemporary and more nuanced way because the world is not static.  We’re not in the world of 1992.  There is much more diversity in the GDPs, in the trade potential, in the competitiveness of different countries, and in their capacity to tackle climate change.”

The agreement that came out of Lima mostly papered over such differences.  Expect the arguments to continue right up through the COP 21 summit in Paris next year.

But perhaps most importantly, the economics have changed.  The cost of wind power has declined 40 percent since the Copenhagen summit, and the cost of solar power 80 percent, making the switch to renewable energy seem more feasible.  Meanwhile, the costs of inaction seem ever clearer, noted Glen Murray, the Minister of Environment and Climate Change for the province of Ontario, even if they are often overlooked.

“Our food supply comes from California, and so our prices have risen 20 percent due to the drought.  The drought in Brazil has driven coffee prizes up by 10 percent,” explained Murray.  “Buffalo just had an extreme snowstorm even by its standards.  Toxic algae made water undrinkable in Toledo.  This is the reality of inaction.   ”The modest goal for the Paris agreement next year is to have each country offer up what it can, based on its current actions and plans, through “intended nationally determined commitments” (or INDCs, to use the latest acronym to sweep the COP).  This is the “bottom up” or “soft” approach described by Andrew Revkin at the start of the summit, although the combined commitments almost certainly won’t be enough to keep the planet below the politically agreed target of 2 degrees Celsius average warming.

Read original article at At Climate Talks in Lima, Only the Arguing Remains the Same - by James Fahn