Ozone Depletion and Global Warming
Thrust onto the international agenda in 1975, the issue of ozone depletion is a relative success story of international cooperation. States recognized an environmental
problem—that global emissions of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), concentrated in the
polar regions, has led to a thinning of the ozone layer over the earth. Strong measures were needed. Both developed and developing countries became involved, with
the latter receiving financial aid from the former to finance changes in technology.
Substitutes for CFCs were developed, and multinational corporations eventually
supported the prohibition of CFCs in the 1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances
That Deplete the Ozone Layer. As a result, the depletion of the ozone layer was
reversed. The story is in part a success story; consumption of ozone-depleting substances has dropped 75 percent since the Montreal Protocol. Outside the polar
zones, the ozone layer is recovering, but at the poles, the loss is variable. Complete
recovery could take decades after the harm has stopped. But that success has had an
unintended consequence. CFCs were replaced with manmade hydrofluorocarbons
(HFCs). While those do not deplete the ozone and last for only a short time, they
do contribute to global warming.
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The issue of global climate change has proved much more complicated. There
are no inexpensive substitutes for agricultural, communications, and industrial
processes that emit greenhouse gases; the costs of reducing emissions are high and
must be paid now, while the benefits are diffuse and may only emerge after decades. But scientific facts are indisputable. The preponderance of greenhouse gas
emissions comes from the burning of fossil fuels in the industrialized countries
of the North, and increasingly from China and India’s growing use of fossil fuels.
Greenhouse gases are also emitted by the developing countries, most notably from
deforestation of the tropics for agriculture and the timber industry (see Figure 11.3).
These greenhouse emissions have consequences.
FIGURE 11.3
Carbon Dioxide Emissions by Region
Carbon Dioxide Emissions in Metric Tons (billions)
35
Africa
Rest of
Asia
Central and
South America
Middle East
30
India
25
China
20
15
Europe and Eurasia
10
5
North America
0
1990
95
2000
05
10
16
Source: “CO2 Emissions,” The Economist, June 17, 2017, www.economist.com (accessed 2/15/18).
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The earth is warming, with an increase of between 1.9 and 3 degrees Celsius
estimated by the end of the twenty-first century, relative to temperatures recorded
between 1986 and 2005. “The atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts
of snow and ice have diminished, sea level has risen, and the concentrations
of greenhouse gases have increased,” the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change reported in 2013. A year later, the same group affirmed once again that
the human influence on climate change is clear.14 The scientific community finds
the evidence compelling. Glaciers and sea ice are melting, oceans are becoming
acidified, and unusual weather events like hurricanes and floods are occurring
more frequently.
The scientific fact of climate change has a human cost. Small island states and
states with low elevations near the seas already see their land subsiding and their
national territory shrinking; their populations are experiencing higher rates of
waterborne diseases, due to increased temperatures and changes in rainfall. For small
island states dependent on tourism, these effects have an impact on the livelihood of
the population. In the Maldives, where 95 percent of the labor force is involved in
tourism, or in the Bahamas, where 70 percent is dependent on tourism, tourists stay
away when beaches erode, coral reefs are polluted, and the quality of drinking water
declines. And sea level rise is occurring at 1.22 inches per decade. At that rate, up to
2 billion people could be climate refugees from rising seas by 2100.
Although scientists increasingly agree on the problem—that contemporary
industrial, agricultural, and communications processes have strongly accelerated global warming—politicians and economists struggle to find solutions. This
struggle is not surprising, given the competing interests of various parties.
Industrialized countries seek continued growth, and the South wants to become
industrialized and enjoy the North’s consumer lifestyle; both are made possible
by converting oil and gas to energy. The parties disagree on whether voluntary
restraints or market-based responses will be sufficient for both “worlds” to reach
their economic objectives while at the same time reducing greenhouse emissions
(that is, achieve sustainable growth). If the global response proves insufficient, might
authoritative regulations be needed, and if so, what authority should be invoked to
monitor and enforce them—international, state level, subnational, or even local?
The international community has made several attempts to respond to climate
change through negotiated state action. One of those efforts was the Kyoto Protocol
of 1997, which provided for stabilizing the concentration of greenhouse gases and
delineated international goals for reducing emissions by 2010. The protocol came
into force in 2005, without U.S. support. The George W. Bush administration
argued that the economic costs of moving away from a fossil fuel–based economy would be too high and an unacceptable number of U.S. jobs would be lost.
Furthermore, India and China were not obligated to cut greenhouse gases under
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Kyoto, as they were classified as developing countries. In the Bush administration’s
view, this gave these states an unfair economic advantage. U.S. views, however,
began to change as the private sector realized that climate change was affecting
their operations and that the transition to a “green economy” could be economically beneficial as well as socially responsible. And the U.S. military has acted to
cut greenhouse emissions, in recognition of the growing security threats that rising
sea levels pose for the vulnerability of people and critical food supplies. Some kind
of new approach was necessary.
European states and Japan did sign the Kyoto Protocol and established the EU
Emissions Trading System as a way to reduce industrial greenhouse gas emissions.
States that use less than their allowance may sell credits to others that are not meeting their obligations. However, with the economic recession and the Eurozone crisis,
demand for the permits has dropped, and there is oversupply in the carbon market.
Three lines of thinking have emerged from difficulties with Kyoto. First, perhaps by seeking a comprehensive global treaty, the individuals, groups, states, and
coalitions of states seeking to slow, halt, and reverse global warming have aimed too
high. As Robert Keohane and David Victor have argued, perhaps what is needed
is a kind of middle ground that focuses on key parts of the climate change problem
rather than the whole.15 Many have concluded that the process of trying to accomplish many goals simultaneously is impractical and dysfunctional. Thus, negotiators
have examined issues in a piecemeal fashion for about a decade. Forests were the
priority in 2008, with states agreeing to get credit for saving forests; a fund was
established to help poor countries adapt. Technology and financing were the topics
in 2009, when the parties agreed to focus on new technologies and increase financing to mitigate the effects of climate change.
A second approach has been to get the top three emitters— China (the top emitter), the United States, and India—to come to agreement. In 2013, India agreed to
take on legally binding obligations, but not until after 2020, fearful that such obligations would inhibit growth. In late 2014, China agreed for the first time to stop
its emissions from growing by 2030, and the United States announced new targets
for reducing carbon emissions. These commitments proved to be a critical impetus
for commitments by other states in the 2015 UN climate change talks. These events
showed the key importance of top-level leadership taking the initiative.
For still others, given the reality of global warming and the likely continued failure of efforts to slow or halt it, a third approach is to shift resources into preparing
for and remediating its effects. For example, 80 percent of the world’s population
lives near a coastline and some states are already vulnerable, so mitigation efforts
must, and are, becoming a major priority; neighborhoods have been evacuated and
seawalls constructed. The Netherlands has made major strides in adopting unique
approaches, not only constructing walls, but also using less concrete to permit
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water seepage and constructing reservoirs and parking garages for alternative water
storage. However, for vulnerable poorer states, the financial costs of these kinds of
initiatives are too high.
In December 2015, following two weeks of intensive negotiations, the
195 participants in the Paris climate change talks reached an accord replacing the
Kyoto Protocol. By this time, the effects of climate change on humans were being
felt, not just on small island states, as noted above, but more generally. Then French
president François Hollande expressed the urgency: “Never have the stakes been so
high because this is about the future of the planet, the future of life.”16 In a grand
bargain, states agreed in the Paris Agreement to keep the increase in global average temperature to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius and to pursue efforts to limit
warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. The targets essential to reach that goal are aspirational: abandoning fossil fuels by 2050 and supporting growth in renewable sources
of energy. States agreed to both curb the emission of greenhouse gases and promote
carbon-absorbing sinks like forests. And perhaps most importantly, states agreed to
a process to ensure transparency and accountability by publishing climate plans every
five years, beginning in 2020. While the submission of plans is mandatory, meeting
the targets is not legally binding. Finally, participants agreed that key developed
countries should take the lead. In the end, what made the Paris Agreement possible
was the earlier negotiations between the United States and China, whereby China
agreed to curb its emissions over the long term. In addition, the developed countries
agreed to support the efforts of developing countries to mitigate climate change,
with a $100 billion Green Climate Fund. The agreement entered into force in 2016.
Global warming and climate change are not solved by this agreement, but supporters assert that a structure now exists to tackle the problem in an effective way.
However, the decision in 2017 by U.S. president Donald Trump to withdraw from
the Paris Agreement and to not continue financial support for the climate fund
represents a setback. Since the agreement is not a treaty under American law, the
president has the authority to make that decision; however, there is a “waiting
period,” so the soonest withdrawal would be in 2020. The administration’s rationale is based on domestic factors: it asserts that American jobs are negatively affected
by the agreement; the “imposed” regulations undermine American energy independence; and payments to the climate fund are wasteful.
Critics of the U.S. decision to withdraw both dispute the domestic rationale and
point to the troubling international implications. Withdrawal by the United States,
the world’s second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases, undercuts the collective
effort to reduce emissions and make the transition to a renewable energy future.
And backsliding by the United States may lead others to reduce their commitment.
Clearly, U.S. leadership on the issue is being jeopardized and some fear new leadership will be exercised by China and Europe, displacing the United States.
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The Trump administration is confronting strong support for the agreement from those in the business community who are already heavily invested in
green technology, from civil society actors including environmental NGOs, and
from numerous private transnational regulatory organizations like the Carbon
Disclosure Project, the Climate Bonds Initiative, the Sustainable Forestry
Initiative, and the Global Reporting Initiative. Operating through markets, these
coalitions of business and civil society are writing and implementing key voluntary
rules on carbon emissions, green buildings, and environmental disclosure.17 Key
substate advocates are among the strongest supporters of the Paris Agreement.
California, itself the world’s sixth-largest economy, has already taken aggressive
action to reduce emissions, increase the use of renewable energy sources, and push
for tougher automobile emission standards, joining with 34 other states, including New York and Massachusetts. And these states are forging memos of understanding with Mexico, Canada, and various provinces of Canada and working
with governments of other Paris Agreement members like China. Along with
comparable activities in Europe, these institutional forums provide support for
the agreement, even without the participation of the current U.S. administration.
Climate change clearly will continue to be a high-priority agenda item across
a wide spectrum of state interests, including economic development and national
security. Climate change is an issue that brings with it both very real threats and
opportunities in the twenty-first century, and any efforts to counter climate change
will proceed slowly.
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