The History of the Kyoto Protocol

The Kyoto Protocol is an effort to reduce carbon emissions that damage the environment.

The Kyoto Protocol is an accord between nations designed to combat global warming by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. It is the result of a 1997 meeting in Kyoto, Japan of participating nations in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). As of April 2010, 189 countries had ratified the agreement. The United States is the only major industrial nation which has not ratified the protocol, although it is a party to the UNFCCC.

UNFCCC

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change is an international agreement developed during the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The purpose of the treaty was to initiate efforts to slow global warming and deal with any unavoidable increases in temperature. The agreement did not include any restrictions on emissions or enforcement provisions. These would be determined by future treaty additions, called protocols. An annual Conference of the Parties (COP) to the treaty would establish the protocols.

Conferences of the Parties

The first Conference of the Parties was held in Berlin in 1995. Participants at this meeting decided on a two year assessment period for countries to decide, which options for addressing climate change would work best for their nation. At the second COP meeting the following year in Geneva, Switzerland, the treaty parties agreed to several key points in line with the United States' position on climate change, including acceptance of scientific findings showing a rise in global temperatures since the late 19th century for which human activity was at least partially responsible.

Kyoto COP

The third Conference of the Parties in Kyoto in December 1997 resulted in the Kyoto Protocol. This called for 37 major industrial nations and the European community to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from 2008 to 2012, by an average of five percent below 1990 levels. The protocol was legally binding and included enforcement mechanisms. The participation of the United States in the Kyoto Protocol required ratification by the Senate. American oil companies and automakers protested its provisions and President Bill Clinton never submitted the agreement to the Senate for action, fearing it would not pass.

Bush era

President George W. Bush, a former oil company executive, took office in January 2001 and two months later announced that the United States would no longer participate in the Kyoto process. The United States delegation to a COP meeting in Bonn, Germany, declined to participate in deliberations. Still, the meeting agreed to a United States proposal presented the previous year to allow credits for carbon sinks, forest and agricultural land that absorbs carbon emissions.

Activation

The Kyoto Protocol went into effect Feb.16, 2005 after the required ratification threshold (participation by at least 55 nations representing at least 55 percent of 1990 carbon emissions) was achieved. At the 2005 COP in Montreal, participants agreed to an action plan calling for the Kyoto Protocol to extend beyond 2012 with even further reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. However, the timeline for this new climate change agreement was delayed by disagreement at the 2009 Copenhagen COP meeting.

References

• United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
• "The Ravaging Tide"; Mike Tidwell; 2006