Climate change: a brief history of a long-heralded tragedy

We have known for 124 years that human activity causes climate change. Since 1994 the UN environment summit has been held. Why no substantial agreement has been reached so far to cut gas emissions and prevent global temperature rise

It is 300 years of a history that brought us to this crucial moment. Pollution of the environment on a large scale and as a consequence of human activity began in 1712 when the iron czar, Thomas Newcomen, invented the first steam engine . A discovery that accelerated the Industrial Revolution and the use of coal on a global scale. And the first scientific evidence of climate change began to appear in the early 19th century. Ice ages and other natural changes in paleoclimate were tested and the natural greenhouse effect was identified for the first time . In 1896, the Swedish scientist Svante Arrhenius discovered “feedback loops” that could accelerate climate change. A year later the American geologist Thomas Chamberlin examined carbon cycles to understand their connection to other phenomena.

👉 IMF head demanded COP26 leaders take more ambitious climate action

We have known for 124 years that human activity causes climate change . Despite this, no really effective measures were taken to mitigate the impact. On the contrary, the indiscriminate exploitation of natural resources continued and the powers developed by polluting . It was not until 1988 that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was formed to collect and evaluate the evidence about what was happening. A year later, the then Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Margaret Thatcher, a chemistry graduate, was the first global leader to warn the United Nations of the danger . In his speech he said:“We are witnessing a huge increase in the amount of carbon dioxide reaching the atmosphere … The result is that the change in the future is likely to be fundamental and widespread as we have never known it before .”And he called for a global treaty on climate change. By then, carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels and from industry reached 6 billion tons per year.

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was established in May 1992, during the Second Earth Summit, in Rio de Janeiro. It came into force in March 1994 with the premise of strengthening public awareness on a global scale about the problems related to Climate Change .

At that same meeting, the Conference of the Parties (COP) was created as the supreme body of the Convention and the association of all the countries that are part of it. COP1 was held in Berlin. It was determined that environmental experts, ministers, heads of state, non-governmental organizations and representatives of civil society and the private sector participate in the annual meetings. From there arose the Berlin Mandate, a kind of rather indefinite catalog of commitments , which allowed countries to choose initiatives tailored to their particular needs.

Also there in Berlin, the substantive confrontation that persists to this day, 26 years and 26 COPs later, was raised. Developing countries, led by China, pose to the richest powers: If you developed polluting, why do you want us all to pay the bill now? And they intend to maintain their levels of exploitation of natural resources while Europe and the United States cut their carbon emissions.

A quarter of a century in which the same bid is maintained and which, beyond some technical details, is the one that we are going to experience once again as a backdrop to the Glasgow summit . Economic interests have always been more powerful than the initiatives of some leaders who tried to change the historical course. China has always led the resistance and is followed by several Asian nations and those of the so-called “Bolivarian axis” of Latin America.

Despite resistance, progress was made. In 1997 the Kyoto Protocol was signed . Developed countries undertook to reduce emissions by an average of 5% for the 2008-12 period , with large variations in the objectives of each of them.

The US Senate immediately declared that it would not ratify the treaty. As a consequence, China, Brazil, India and other developing countries reduced their commitments substantially . A few months later, the El Niño current in the Pacific was driving global warming to produce the warmest year on record. The global average temperature reached 0.52C above the average for the period 1961-90 .

With the new century and the water up to the neck, literally, the negotiations accelerated. In those years I covered three COPs, the Bonn High School (2007), in Germany, the Cancun High School, in Mexico (2010) and the Copenhagen High School, in Denmark (2009). In the weeks leading up to all of them, new scientific papers were published showing the impending tragedy and the leaders’ commitment that “this time” there would be substantial agreements .

What happened in Denmark was very particular. As Shakespeare said through Hamlet, it “smelled rotten” from the start even though expectations were the highest in the history of global settlements.Everything was previously agreed to reduce carbon (CO2) emissions to less than 50% in 2050 compared to 1990 . But the euphoria was short-lived.Three weeks before the start of COP15, a meeting was held in Thailand in which China and the United States decided that the Copenhagen agreements would not be binding . Thus, the fate of the Summit was cast before it began.

It was bad news and the few hopes of saving it were buried last night, when the presidents of China, the United States, India, Brazil and South Africa , without the presence of the European representatives, or the rest of the countries, held a meeting at the door. closed and drafted a vague, non-binding agreement of just three pages that was not even put to a vote. Lula da Silva left through the back door and without saying a word. So did Obama, who reappeared at the airport to announce the “agreement” without giving explanations. Journalists and delegates are waiting for what never came. Herman Van Rumpuy, the then president of the European Council, in a confidential cable of US diplomacy, leaked by WikiLeaks, had very harsh expressions before several of the leaders who had been left out:” Copenhagen was an incredible disaster (…) the multilateral summits will not work,” he called the meeting “A nightmare on Elm Street II” and released the lapidary phrase: ” Who wants to see that horror movie again?”

It took a lot to recover from such a failure. It was six years. Until 2015 in Paris, at COP21.There, the Paris Agreement was signed that limits the increase in global temperature to 2 ° C by reducing greenhouse gas emissions, caused by fossil fuels.. And a consensus was reached that the ultimate goal should be to reduce the increase in temperature to only 1.5 degrees Celsius to avoid more climatic catastrophes such as those that have been occurring in recent years. Even China accepted the terms . But the United States, already with Donald Trump in the White House, did not ratify it . Joe Biden just did it a few weeks ago .

We arrived at this COP 26 in Scotland with two specific objectives from the United Nations experts: maintaining the commitment to reduce polluting emissions so that the global increase in average temperature does not exceed the 1.5 degree threshold; and that the richest countries fulfill their commitment to provide 100,000 million dollars a year to help the poorest to meet the reduction targets.

The bonus track would be a global agreement to stop manufacturing fossil fuel traction vehicles after 2040 . Perhaps that happens anyway because of the scientific and technological advances that are being registered, although it is very unlikely that a president like Biden will sign it with the pressure that the Detroit auto industry or the Japanese prime minister with the Toyota breathing him can exert. on the nape.

The fastest thing is going to be the fulfillment of the contributions to the compensation fund. In 2009, rich countries agreed to contribute $ 100 billion per year to finance climate protection until 2020. But in 2019 they failed to meet that goal and “fell short” by about $ 20 billion , according to estimates by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). It is not a sufficient sum to cover the costs of the effects of climate change or the transition to renewable energies, but it is an important aid that generates confidence so that those most in need contribute to emission cuts. Without that money, the little existing trust will be broken.

Meanwhile, there are other dragging issues. For example, cutbacks are still missing from the biggest emitters, such as China, India and Saudi Arabia. It remains to be seen what position Bolsonaro’s Brazil will finally take regarding the permanent deforestation of the Amazon. And if Europe is going to continue being the locomotive of the whole process after the recession caused by the pandemic. Ah yes, the pandemic. We have been going through the hottest decade in history with extraordinary fires and floods and the economic and social halt caused by the Covid does not seem to have produced any substantial change .

The lower activity of the global economy during the pandemic did not stop the process and scientific calculations say that we are already on the way to a temperature increase of 2.7 degrees before the end of the century .This confirms that to really change the course of climate change will require extraordinary efforts from all. And here also appears one of those hopes prior to all the summits. The leaders will arrive in Glasgow pressured by the ghoulish images of environmental catastrophes , the California fires, the floods in Europe. It remains to be seen if those fires and waters are enough to force them to take the bold actions needed to mitigate this long-heralded tragedy.