Talk:Kyoto Protocol

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[edit] NPOV nuclear energy in France

Current positions of governments: France

"In 2004, France shut down its last coal mine, and now gets 80% of its electricity from nuclear power.[56] Because of this, France now has the cleanest air of any industrialized country, and the cheapest electricity bills in all of Europe.[57] Under various assumptions, including the use of breeder technology, the earth has enough uranium to provide all of the world's energy needs until the sun blows up in 5 billion years."

This section implies nuclear energy is both cheap and clean, this is certainly not NPOV because both the cleanness and the economics of nuclear power are highly controversial (see Wikipedia article on nuclear power). However it would be NPOV to say that France's reliance on nuclear power for electricity production is one reason why it relatively low emissions of CO2. I don't see how the sentence about uranium resources has any relevance to the French government's position on the Kyoto Protocol and should be taken out. 82.35.64.184 20:34, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you... and the fact is that France HAS NOT "the cleanest air of any industrialized country". As we are talking about GHG, we should take this list into account: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/env_co2_emi_percap-environment-co2-emissions-per-capita Switzerland and Sweden have lower emissions, just the same way some other countries that are quite developed (Lith., and other). -- 83.37.98.45 20:16, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
A side point -- a more accurate list may be found right here on wikipedia see List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita Furthermore, data valid through 2006 may be found at The EPA SunSw0rd (talk) 15:30, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Summary style

The article might benefit from use of summary style. Has it been considered? Richard001 11:40, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] the word 'target', does not appear in the (English) text of the treaty

the word target, often used by the press, is substituted for obligation/limitation, for unknown motives. Non-annex-one countries, such as Nicaragua, --> no limitation, therefore, no target. For Annex-one countries, such as Canada, have a limitation, synonomous with obligation, NOT a goal or target. CorvetteZ51 07:39, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

...And your point is? It seems pretty obvious that if a government is obliged by international treaty to achieve certain levels of emission (or other thing), that these things become the minimum levels of compliance in accordance to their obligations. If you are attempting to achieve these levels, then that becomes a "target" for government policymaking. There is nothing inconsistent with calling these obligatory levels 'targets', but it does definately take fewer words and letters; thus useful for (particularly print) media. What is there to gain by your comment? 220.235.138.202 11:06, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] GHG Emissions since 1990

Should the article list emission with or without LULUCF? For the Kyoto Protocol, LULUCF should be taken into account! -- 83.37.98.45 20:30, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

LULUCF needs to be discussed. LULUCF, in the case of Austalia, considers the cessation of land clearance, as an allowance to pollute more. By the treaty, Aus gets a 8 percent increase. But because Australia has reduced land clearance from its 1990 pace, Aus is allowed to pollute 25% for its 'normal sources'. CorvetteZ51 13:40, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Confusing

"Although the UK's overall greenhouse gas emissions have fallen, annual net carbon dioxide emissions have risen by around 2% since The Labour Party came to power in 1997." This seems confusing to me. Can anyone clarify what it is trying to say? Brusegadi 02:39, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

There are scheduled greenhouse gasses other than carbon dioxide,so it is possible (but I am not saying, it is the case that) the total, and CO2 separately, could go in different directions. CorvetteZ51 (talk) 08:16, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Number of countries?

The text says:

As of June 2007, 175 Parties have ratified the Protocol. Of these, 36 countries and the EEC are required to reduce greenhouse gas emissions below levels specified for each of them in the treaty (representing over 61.6% of emissions from Annex I countries). Notable exceptions include the United States and Australia. One hundred thirty seven countries (137) have ratified the protocol, but have no obligation beyond monitoring and reporting emissions.

Just a minor thing...36+137=173, not 175.

58.111.105.30 09:34, 12 November 2007 (UTC)


I have another comment on this. In the Description section the article says:

The Kyoto Protocol now covers more than 170 countries globally and more than 60% of countries in terms of global greenhouse gas emissions.

And then later in the Status of the agreement one can read:

As of November 2007, a total of 175 countries and other governmental entities have ratified the agreement (representing over 61.6% of emissions from Annex I countries).[11][12]

So, which one is correct? Or can both of them be true? I find it a little confusing.

Oleg326756 (talk) 22:05, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] A treaty is either ratified or not - there should be no special category "hope to ratify"

Fourth paragraph Inconsistent with seventh paragraph which mentions Kazakhstan as well as the US and Australia not to have ratified.

172 parties have ratified the protocol. Of these, 36 countries (plus the EU as a party in its own right) are required to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to the levels specified for each of them in the treaty (representing over 61.6% of emissions from Annex I countries) [2] [3], with three more countries intending to participate[4]. Notable exceptions include the United States and Australia. One hundred thirty seven (137) countries have ratified the protocol, but have no obligation beyond monitoring and reporting emissions.

Seventh paragraph Inconsistent with fourth paragraph which mentions Australia as well not to have ratified.

The Kyoto Protocol now covers more than 170 countries globally and more than 60% of countries in terms of global greenhouse gas emissions. As of November 2007, the US, and Kazakhstan are the only signatory nations, not to have ratified the act. This treaty expires in 2012, and international talks began in May 2007 on a future treaty to succeed the current one.[5]

Image - Status of the Agreement A country either has or has not ratified the protocol. There should be no difference other than that. What exactly does 'hope to ratify it' mean? It is ridiculous and meaningless. How can this possibly be a separate category other than presumably to put both Australia and Kazakhstan in a better light in contrast to the red of the US which clearly stands alone?

Participation in the Kyoto Protocol: dark green indicates countries that have signed and ratified the treaty, yellow indicates those that have signed and hope to ratify it, and red indicates those that have signed but not ratified it.

Smurf1812 (talk) 04:04, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

The current caption is even worse. The US is a signatory and should not be red ("those that neither signed nor ratified the treaty") Andareed 22:09, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Australia ratified the Kyoto Protocol on December 3rd, 2007

Australia's new prime minister, Kevin Rudd, signed the instrument of ratification of the Kyoto Protocol as one of his first acts as Prime Minister.

cf: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/12/03/2108345.htm —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.170.161.135 (talk) 07:55, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Remark about the Australian Constitution

"According to the Constitution of Australia,[25] environmental matters are under the jurisdiction of the States, and the NETS is intended to facilitate ratification of the Kyoto Protocol by the incoming Labor Government." What is the purpose of this comment? Those areas not under s51 or s52 of the Australian Constitution, such as Education, Health and the Environment, come under the State's residual powers. However, as the Tasmanian Dams case clearly demonstrated, the External Affairs power of the Commonwealth permits that an international treaty to which the Commonwealth has signed (and is thus obliged to uphold) can overrule the State's residual powers. Thus, mentioning NETS under the Australian Constitution doesnt make sense and appears to be factually wrong. So, why is it included? 220.235.138.202 11:06, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV: Colors In Image, Incorrect Understanding of U.S. Procedure

The colors used are highly biased and suggest a disposition toward ratification and acceptance of the terms of the Kyoto Protocol. Neutral colors, or tones of one color should be used.

Also, a representative of the United States government signed, but it was never submitted for ratification. That does not mean the U.S. Congress declined ratification. Rather, they were never given the opportunity. This would suggest a "Pending" status. Furthermore, the U.S. Congress outlined what should be included to hasten ratification.

To have such a biased graphic in support of a document that is clearly itself biased (it requires no obligation of most of its signatories, and "differentiated" requirements of States such as China, India) is grossly misrepresentative and very un-Wikipedia. At the least, a comparative graphic showing the requirements placed on States by the document would be informative and telling.

To negatively and falsely isolate without context, one nation that has not ratified is absurd.

Please make the changes or delete the file. I posted this on the particular image's talk page as well, but this appears to be a better forum. (67.106.135.226 16:25, 4 December 2007 (UTC))

Thanks for raising your concerns here. However, if this was, say, an article was on "left-handedness", would you not agree that colours showing a disposition towards the topic of the article was be logicial?
I think you need to reread the US sub-section, as it never states that Congress actually declined ratification. To claim a "Pending" status would imply that the Pres. will submit it, and that Congress will agree to its ratification - at best this would be double guessing both parties, at worst, very POV, and un-wiki. Previous US governments were active in the development of the protocol with its explicitly "common but differentiated responsibility" principle at its core, although the current President has, on many occasions, clearly indicated that he does not agree with it and will not recommend it to Congress for ratification. (Saying that he approves of the protocol but not its core principles is a funny way of showing support.) Congress has also traditionally been hostile, even while the federal govt was negotiating the protocol. This is stated - at length and somewhat more delicately - within the article under its rather large section on the USA.
To compare with the situation in Kazakhstan, the government there is actively and genuinely committed, and is pursuing steps to join in. In fact, they would already have done so if they could have overcome some technical legal hurdles earlier. You could realistically describe them as "Pending" or, better still, "pursuing ratification" as their intentions are clear.
The List of Kyoto Protocol signatories does illuminate this, and you may find it interesting to read the section on Annex I countries, as these have the most onerous requirements. Incidentally, these Annex I parties must use the carbon trading systems first mooted by the US negotiators. Ephebi 17:30, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
I thought it was sent to congress and then it got its ass kicked...! Brusegadi (talk) 08:33, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
No, but the Senate passed a preemptory resolution against it. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 08:42, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
In fact the United States Senate passes a "Sense of the Senate" resolution by 95 to zero that "the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol to, or other agreement regarding, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change of 1992, at negotiations in Kyoto in December 1997, or thereafter..."
Basic reasoning was that the Senate would not sign unless developing countries were subject to the same conditions AND that the treaty should not result "in serious harm to the economy of the United States". So anytime anyone hears politicians blaming the US not signing the Kyoto treaty on Bush -- the simple fact is that the US Senate informed the President (Bill Clinton at that time) that there was no way they were ratifying the Kyoto treaty as written -- by a 95-0 vote. SunSw0rd (talk) 15:38, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] the EU ETS is completely separate from Kyoto

Please post any evidence to the contrary. CorvetteZ51 (talk) 00:07, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

  • Like any stock market, there are two parts to the trading mechanism - the market process, and the settlement process. The spot, futures & options markets systems operate independent of the ETS & Kyoto settlement systems, other than their contracts, which are compatible. But post-trade, the "settlement" systems are run by government bodies and are what enforce the Kyoto-ness on everything. Most market players don't need to be aware of this unless there is a problem somewhere.
  • operators in Phase I are allowed to access CERs during this period, and the CDM executive has been busy approving lots of CDM projects for the last year or two for them. For concrete proof of how interlinked they are, the EC recently announced it has problems linking into the UN before the March 2008 CDM deadline for 2007 delivery. The market got the jitters and EUA prices jumped about 10% in an hour [1] That proof represents about $4bn that industry will have to find.
  • Phase II of will, of course, totally run under Kyoto mechanisms Ephebi (talk) 01:54, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

OK, so what is the connection between Kyoto and the ETS, other than ETS will accept Kyoto credits? It certainly does not work the other way. Keep in mind that if the EU makes its own goal, that hasnothing to with the EU meeting its Kyoto obligation.CorvetteZ51 (talk) 02:57, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

  • Don't understand what what you mean about "the other way", as CERs only have a value when monetised in Annex I countries' trading system. The legal relationship of course differs between Phase I & II, although, as indicated above, neither Phase would look like this without Kyoto. Ref Annex I, the EU and EU member states must each meet individual national 5-year treaty commitments during Phase II/Kyoto commitment period (although they can exceed their UNFCCC target if they wish, while implementing their own policies for non-industrial sources). However, a fundamental principle is that each EAU = AAU = CER = ERU and so everything in the EU system has to be at least compatible or more restrictive. Otehrwise we would end up with incompatible markets. Compare this to, say, the RGGI scheme, which I hope we will agree is independent & incompatible. Their allocations are not within a framework of Kyoto as no targets were set at US state level. They also only address power generation so the demand for allowances is incompatible. Their measurement is for short tons & hence there measure are 9% less than an AAU, if they were to measure at the same point (which I'm not sure that they are). Thus, even if hypothetically it was legally possible, one RGGI units would not be tradable against an AAU/CER without some degree of conversion and arbitrage. The EU ETS system has addressed this by aligning itself tightly to Kyoto. Also see your talk page.
  • PS I noted that this link the EU will meet its target by distributing different rates among its member state has been interpreted here in the past to mean that the EU's executive body has had the legal ability to readjust national commitments. This is a misreading of the text, it just means that there is an average across the EU but different value have been negotiated by the member states under the UNFCCC. Note the EU cannot (re)negotiate international treaties on behalf of its member states (though this may change as/when the EU constitution/treaty gets ratified). Ephebi (talk) 12:53, 12 December 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Included column with LULUCF

I have added a column to the table of change in national emissions, so that the changes with and without LULUCF can be seen. I felt this is relevant, given that the accounting mechanism will ultimately make allowance for LULUCF.Ordinary Person (talk) 02:11, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Where did you get the data for the "with LULUCF" column? The figure for the USA can't be right. American LULUCF is a net sink. Vinny Burgoo (talk) 12:43, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wall St Journal editorial claiming "proof" of failure of Kyoto mechanism

I removed this text: Further complicating the debate over the Kyoto Protocol is the fact that CO2 emissions growth in the US was far ahead of that of the EU-15 from 1990-2000, but from 2000-2004, America's rate of growth in CO2 emissions was eight percentage points lower than from 1995-2000, while the EU-15 saw an increase of 2.3 points. From 2000-2004, the United States' CO2 emissions growth rate was 2.1%, compared to the EU-15's 4.5%. That happened while the US economy was expanding 38% faster than the economies of the EU-15 while experiencing population growth at twice the rate of the EU-15. This naturally has led to questions and debate about the merits of a mandatory emissions cap approach (as currently adopted under Kyoto) versus a voluntary approach to emissions reduction (as adopted by the United States).

I did so reluctantly because:

  • this editorial opinion criticises the Kyoto mechanisms set down by emissions data before a) the Kyoto protocol has come into force & b) before the EU-ETS mandatory trading scheme has come into place. It key tenet - that the EU's trading mechanism is poor because EU emissions caps were poorly set - has no relationship to the agreed quotas mandated under Kyoto which will come into force next year (2008).
  • if this is a valid criticism, then the EU ETS article is the place for it
  • The general issue of philosophical disagreement with the approach (which is what I understand this opinion to be) is already covered elsewhere in the article.

I noted the reference to the editorial Europe v. America on CO2 Wall Street Journal is subscription only - a partial transcript is here. Ephebi (talk) 13:04, 17 December 2007 (UTC)


[edit] IPCC predictions

"The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has predicted an average global rise in temperature of 1.4°C (2.5°F) to 5.8 °C (10.4°F) between 1990 and 2100)."

These are the predictions from the Third Assessment Report. The Fourth Assessment Report predicts a rise "between 1.1 and 6.4 °C (2.0 and 11.5 °F) during the 21st century" (according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intergovernmental_Panel_on_Climate_Change). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Simonbc (talk • contribs) 11:24, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Opening Sentence

The opening sentence, "The Kyoto Protocol is a protocol to the international Framework Convention on Climate Change with the objective of reducing Greenhouse gases that cause climate change", sounds gramatically odd. It's the "a protocal to" that sounds funny. Should'nt it be "protocal from" or something like that? 167.102.224.45 (talk) 18:27, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

  • grammatically, its fine - protocols are added to treaties (or to the convention, in this case). Ephebi (talk) 21:47, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Annex I and ratification?

The article (particularly the 'description section') appears to say that Annex I countries are all bound to targets, however this is not the case as the US have not ratified the protocol, but are an Annex I country ([2]). I think this needs to be portrayed in the article as it got me rather confused. Niel.bowerman (talk) 15:41, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

True. Any nation that refuses to sign (ratify) or withdraw from the treaty is not bound by its rules. Only when having ratified the protocol, including consequences of non-conpliance, can a nation be penalized for its behaviour by a designated authority. However, this is a general feature of international treaties, and reference to it in this article would best be done by linking to a page on this topic at most, for instance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty#Withdrawal Seems about right? (Jorritg (talk) 23:05, 6 May 2008 (UTC))

[edit] Other concerns

This is a great article, but it really doesn't address some of the Constitutional concerns that the U.S. has concerning Kyoto. Article VI of the United States Constitution makes it clear that the Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land. Nothing can legally contradict or overrule it--not an act of Congress, not an Executive Order, not a Judicial Ruling, not a state law, and not the Bible or any other Holy Book. Furthermore, and this is little understood, treaties made with foreign governments and ratified as provided in the United States Constitution are second only to the Constitution itself as the supreme law of the land. Thus, to the extent that any Federal or state statue, regulation, or judicial ruling conflicts with a legally ratified international treaty, the treaty takes precedence and the conflicting law is invalid.

'supreme' trumps 'state' law. just another federal law.CorvetteZ51 (talk) 13:15, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

I think this needs to be better addressed in the article. Thoughts? Supertheman (talk) 08:17, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

What exactly are you talking about here? The Kyoto protocol doesn't have any requirements that makes it any more different than any other international agreement. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 08:41, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Is the first statement meant to explain the notion that the U.S. will not accept any non-US authority as supreme over the national authority? If so, its been desribed in a complicated manner. If reference be made to it in this article, then perhaps better by a link to a general page to this more often voiced stance of the U.S., f.i. with the case of jurisdiction of the international court of justice, amongst others. Right? (Jorritg (talk) 23:25, 6 May 2008 (UTC))

[edit] Check citations

Citation no. 62 is obsolete, in that the server it is stored on has moved it... can someone check this pls? 81.166.40.97 (talk) 22:15, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ridiculous!

According to this, Latvia has reduced its GHG emissions by 165% from 1990 levels. How have they achieved this miracle? --Devilinhell (talk) 11:59, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Section "Support", Canada

Those two sentences are false in Canada AFAIK. The minority Conservative goverment doesn't support the protocol and the opposition passed a bill to comply with the treaty :

No country has passed national legislation requiring compliance with their treaty obligation. The governments of all of the countries whose parliaments have ratified the Protocol are supporting it.

I think we should simply remove this part.zorxd (talk)