Climate Change Challenge: the European Perspective - Speech by Ambassador Valenzuela, Head of the EC delegation to the UN

Summary: 30 October 2008, New York - Speech by Ambassador Fernando M. Valenzuela, Head of the Delegation of the European Commission to the UN, on "Climate Change Challenge: the European Perspective" to the Alliance Program, the Earth Institute and the European Institute of Columbia University

It's a pleasure - and honor - to be here tonight to address such an innovative collaboration between iconic educational institutions: Columbia University, Ecole Polytechnique, Sciences Po and Universite Paris - Pantheon Sorbonne. This type of cooperation attests to the diversity and depth of the transatlantic relationship, and adds significantly to it. I commend you for it.

Just thinking back to when we first discussed the topic for this event several months ago, the Climate Change issue was the logical choice, almost a no-brainer: it was at the top of the international agenda, and a topic where the EU is clearly in the forefront, with its ambitious 20-20-20 proposal, that is, a 20% reduction in EU greenhouse gas emissions from 1990 levels; 20% of EU energy consumption via renewables; and 20% improved energy efficiency, all by the year 2020.

Of course, the current financial crisis, which is now looking certain to become a full-fledged economic crisis, was not even contemplated at that point.

How quickly things can change. But even though it might seem more important now to focus on the financial meltdown, rather than a very expensive prevention of a potential Arctic meltdown, we should, as President Barroso has said, be careful of setting up false dichotomies. Of confusing short-term crises with the longer term imperatives.

One thing I don't have to do here, thankfully, is convince you that climate change and global warming is a reality, that it is accelerating and that it is largely a man-made phenomenon. The science is irrefutable, and the scientific community overwhelmingly endorses the Nobel Prize-winning work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's findings, notably that a temperature rise beyond 2 degrees Centigrade above pre-industrial levels - and we are fast approaching this - would likely trigger a number of tipping points that would lead to further accelerated, irreversible and unpredictable climate changes.

Like an ice-free Arctic by 2060 under present trends, and what that implies for coastal regions and small island states, like the Maldives (which would disappear!). Or the loss of 70% the glaciers in the European Alps. Cautionary trends abound.

And impacts are already being felt. The UN estimates that all but one of its emergency appeals for humanitarian aid in 2007 was climate-related. The tragic situation in Darfur has roots in climate change - a prolonged drought, which has led to water scarcity, and violent conflict.

Climate change is best viewed as a threat multiplier, which exacerbates existing trends, tensions and instability. It is a major element of the EU's international security agenda.

In this light, both the EU and the international community must be capable of dealing with the current financial challenges AND the difficulties posed by climate change and energy insecurity. In fact, the two are linked; we'll have to walk and chew gum at the same time.

As it happens, some EU Member States have been making noises recently that the Energy and Climate package on the table might be too expensive in light of the current crisis, or that it could put European competitiveness at too much of a disadvantage. Naturally, there are legitimate concerns, especially from energy intensive sectors.

But in fact, the economic case for the energy and climate package is compelling:

• The costs of climate change will be much higher if we don't start making adjustments now - up to 20% of GDP eventually according to the Stern Review, versus 0.5% of GDP cost projected via the package;

• Without the package, the EU will be much more vulnerable to energy shocks, with potentially drastic consequences for our economies - currently we import 55% of our energy needs, and this could rise to 70% by 2030, assuming present trends;

• And, more positively, moving to a lower carbon economy brings big opportunities - if the EU exploits its first mover advantage. Achieving a 20% share for renewables, for example, could generate more than a million jobs in this industry by 2020.

So, it is more important than ever that we move ahead with this energy and climate change package, not despite the financial crisis, but partly in response to it.

We, the European Commission, will also come out with our second Strategic Energy Review next month, which will help complete and consolidate our energy security and climate change actions in the medium term.

To put it in the international context, as we move toward a new international agreement in 2009 to succeed Kyoto, there is no better way to show that Europe can walk the walk, as well as talk the talk, than to adopt our package this December.

But the EU is no newcomer to the climate change question, having been tackling it since the early 1990s. We were actively involved in the 1992 Framework Convention on Climate Change, as well as the Kyoto Protocol, which came into force in 2005.

The EU15 are, in fact, on track to meet their Kyoto commitments - an 8% reduction in overall emissions below 1990 levels by 2012 (and reductions of 6-8% by the newer Member States as well). It hasn't been easy, but the reality is hopeful: Europe's economy has grown by 25% since 1990, and we've cut emissions by 8%, showing that there is no inherent contradiction between economic growth and reducing emissions.

Already in 2000 we launched the European Climate Change programme (ECCP), under which we developed a range of cost-effective emission reduction measures. Key among these has been the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), in place since 2005, the world's first and largest international emissions trading scheme, covering almost half of EU Co2 emissions.

This is the cornerstone of EU climate policy, whereby our policy makers set a total cap on emissions, but leave it to the market to decide where emissions reductions take place, through the buying and selling of emission rights. Being the first, we had some bumps at the beginning with the ETS, especially around the carbon price, but the system works, and could be the model for a similar mechanism at the global level post-Kyoto. Our particular challenge within the EU is to extend the ETS to energy intensive sectors currently exempted - another part of our Climate and Energy package presently on the table - and to bring in the transport and aviation sectors. In fact EU Member States have just agreed to include aviation in the ETS, whose emissions have a multiplying green house effect in the upper reaches of the atmosphere.

The EU has also been active within the G-8 with regard to climate change, which has made significant progress in agreeing to at least 50% emission reductions by 2050, which coincides with the Bali roadmap for the UN negotiations.

We, the EU, are also in a unique position to respond to the impacts of climate change on international security, given our leading role in development, global climate policy and the wide array of tool and instruments at our disposal, not to mention our comprehensive approaches to conflict prevention, crisis management and post-conflict reconstruction.

Another source that puts Europe in the lead on climate change: popular support. According to a recent Eurobarmeter poll - admittedly taken before the financial crisis - three quarters of EU citizens take the problem of climate change very seriously, and 62% of respondents considered climate change to be one of the two most serious problems facing the world today. Only Poverty scored higher. And 56% believe that fighting climate change can have a positive effect on the economy.

So, how do we approach the road to Copenhagen and the ambitious but necessary actions to adapt to and mitigate climate change?

First, I believe we will come to an agreement on the Energy and Climate package, strengthening our hand as a pacesetter within the multilateral negotiations.

Ten days ago, EU Environment Ministers reaffirmed their commitment a successful global climate agreement via the Bali roadmap, and established the EU's position going into the next UN Climate Conference in Poznan, Poland December 1-12.

They again stressed that the Copenhagen agreement would have to limit global warming to no more than 2 degrees C above preindustrial levels, which would require a reduction in worldwide greenhouse gases by 2050 of at least 50% vis-à-vis 1990 levels. To this end, developed countries would have to collectively reduce GHG emissions by 25 to 40% below 1990 levels by 2020, with the target of achieving 80-95% reductions by 2050.

The EU has pledged to cut its emissions by 30% by 2020, over an above its voluntary target of 20%, if other developed countries commit to comparable reductions, and if the economically more advanced developing countries, where emissions are growing fastest, contribute adequately, according to their capabilities. We do not believe that developing countries should or indeed could take on the same commitments as the industrialized countries. But if you don't have China, now the world's largest GHG emitter in total (not per capita terms), or India, Brazil and others on board, not to mention the US, which never signed on to Kyoto, an international accord will have little effect.

I would like to also underline the EU's consistent solidarity with the Least Developed countries, particularly in Africa, and with the Small Island States, which contribute very little to global warming, but will be most affected by climate change. These countries should benefit from the Copenhagen agreement in terms of clean energy and sustainable development, and other coping mechanisms.

In a related area, deforestation is currently responsible for almost 20% of global greenhouse emissions. As trees are our best allies when it comes CO2 reductions, and forests are the most efficient carbon sinks, the Commission has just put forth concrete options for tackling deforestation in these negotiations, including the development of a Global Forest Carbon Mechanism, which would reward developing countries for emission reductions achieved by actions to reduce deforestation and forest degradation. Funding for this proposed mechanism would come from proceeds of the EU Emissions Trading System. And we will continue to work on such innovative ideas on financing for adaptation and mitigation in the context of the climate change talks.

So, clearly, the EU is a major player in the climate change talks, committed to an ambitious outcome, but with an important short-term internal test to this leadership role. I'm hopeful that we'll pass it.

Turning Europe into a low carbon economy is one necessary part of our fight against climate change, and it would be the right move even if climate change were not happening. Here, we have some control over what we do. But the climate change problem is global, caused by global emissions. And if we don't have an adequate global response, Europe's best efforts to limit its 15% share of global green house emissions will not make much of a difference. And we cannot afford to fail.

Ref: SP08-407EN
EU source: European Commission
UN forum:
Date: 30/10/2008

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