Dossiers

What is the Kyoto Protocol?
Adopted on 11 December 1997 in Japan by member states of the UNFCCC, the convention-framework of the United Nations on climate change, the Kyoto Protocol establishes legally binding limits on greenhouse gas emissions in industrialized countries. In virtue of this text, industrialist countries must reduce their emissions of six gases, most notably carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide, by an average of 5.2%, in relation to 1990 levels, between the period of 2008-2012.
What’s more, the Kyoto Protocol includes flexibility mechanisms, namely the trading of emission allowances. Seeing that the problem of climate change is a global concern, it matters little where the reductions take place. Industrialized countries can thus trade their allowances and obtain supplementary credits by setting up emission reduction projects abroad. Reductions can thus be accomplished at the most affordable locations.
The commitments of the protocol will be binding once it is put into action, subordinate to its ratification by at least 55 of the UNFCCC states, including industrialized countries responsible for at least 55% of the carbon dioxide emissions in 1990. For the moment, the 1997 text has no obligatory character: over one hundred states ratified the text, but these only represent 44.2% of CO2 emissions. The United States, alone responsible for 36.1% of these emissions, refused to ratify the protocol. Russia, representing 17.4% of global carbon dioxide emissions, has announced that it would soon ratify the protocol.

Europe and the Kyoto Protocol
In the name of the Kyoto Protocol, the European Union has committed to reducing its emissions of greenhouse gases by 8% during the 2008-2012 period, the so-called “first stage of commitment.” A community-wide agreement that aims to share the burden between member states has established objectives for each one of them. The EU ratified the Kyoto Protocol on 31 May 2002.
The ten countries that will join the EU on 1 May 2004 have also ratified the text and have had reductions imposed on them that vary between 6% and 8% between the years 2008 and 2012.
The Union has undertaken to set up its own system of trading emission allowances via a directive voted at the European Parliament last July. These trades will begin in 2005 for the twenty-five members of the greater EU.
While the Union reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 3.3% between 1990 and 2000, the emissions augmented by 0.3% between 1999 and 2000 and by 1% between 2000 and 2001. The global reduction can be explained essentially by the efforts of Germany, which has reached a diminution of 18.3% in the last decade, namely due to the economic restructuring of the former DDR. The United Kingdom has posted a 12% reduction, and Luxembourg a reduction of 44.2%. But no less than ten member states remain far below their obligations.

Global Warming: An Urgent Problem
The severe heat wave that struck Europe this summer and brought about several thousands of deaths is one of the many manifestations of global warming. The 1990s were the hottest years recorded since 1861.
It is now urgent to implement measures to combat this phenomenon. In the absence of efficient decisions, the average temperature of the surface of the earth could augment, according to a recent intergovernmental report on climate change, from 1.4°C to 5.8°C between 1990 and 2100. During this same period the sea level will rise from 9 to 88 centimeters because of melting glaciers.
These dramatic changes will have serious repercussions on the ecosystem: the breakdown of different animal species will change and a number of them will disappear. Rainfall will be modified, which will in turn disturb water and irrigation systems in many regions. Extreme meteorological phenomena and flooding will multiply, with serious repercussions in terms of economic costs and human sufferance.
Developing countries will be especially hit by these evolutions and tropical illness will gain ground.

A New Union Commitment
The decision reached on 21 October 2003 by the European Parliament showed, according to Margot Wallström, European Commissioner of the Environment, “the decisive will of the UE to implement the accords of the Kyoto Protocol and to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases.” She went on to say, “Once we ratified the protocol, we knew that we were committing to implementing concrete measures. This decision is an illustration of that.”
The new European text imposes on its member states more numerous and precise measures regarding the reporting of greenhouse gas emission figures. What’s more, it establishes more precise measures regarding emission allowances, which will help improve calculations reliability.
The decision aims to implement the infrastructure foreseen by the Kyoto Protocol in fields such as national monitoring systems of emissions and registers that report trades of emission allowances. It obligates member states to see that, on an annual basis, their emissions correspond to the allowances that were set by the protocol.
The text also calls for a re-examination of the situation in 2006, on the basis of which Brussels may formulate proposals to ensure the commitments of the European Union and its member states.
Member states will be able to choose between 1995 and 1990 as the year of reference to measure progress in terms of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This provision is particularly advantageous for Finland and France which had already, at the beginning of the 1990s, managed to reduce their emissions. The Commission, formerly strongly opposed to this solution because it thought it would engender diverse technical and political problems – many states don’t have reliable records for 1990 – finally approved the compromise which had already been agreed upon by the European Parliament and the Council.