Introduction:
Climate Change
The
Earths atmosphere keeps the planet warm. Without the warming cover of natural
greenhouse gases, mainly carbon dioxide (CO
2)
and water vapour, life could not exist on Earth. Through the release of
greenhouse gases such as CO
2,
methane, CFCs and N
2O
caused by human activities, our climate will change. How fast, and where
exactly, is still controversial, but there is consensus in the scientific
community that the consequences may be serious:
- the
expected rise in sea levels may threaten islands and nations with low coast
lines;
- changes
in rainfall levels and patterns may affect natural vegetation, agriculture and
forestry;
- the
loss of biodiversity may be accelerated if climate zones move so fast that
species (e.g. in rain forests) cannot follow them;
- weather
anomalies such as hurricanes may occur more frequently, causing immense damage
to humans and their property, and to nature.
Not
all possible consequences are fully understood. For example, it is very
uncertain:
- to
what extent greenhouse gas-induced disturbances of the ocean-atmosphere
equilibrium contribute to altered global circulation patterns such as the
El
Niño
phenomenon;
- whether
the gulf stream, Europes central heating, could change its direction and/or
intensity, thus leading to a drastic
cooling
of Europes climate;
The
Member States of the European Union are responsible for about one quarter of
the global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. A global strategy must also
take into account the emissions caused by rapid economic growth in developing
countries. Most of these nations are
technology
buyers
using, voluntarily or forced by the markets, energy-relevant technologies such
as cars and power plants that are developed and produced in Europe, Japan and
the USA. Progress towards more energy-efficient technologies in the EU may
therefore have strong positive side-effects in other regions of the globe that
may even be greater, in the long run, than the direct emission reductions
observed in the EU itself.
At
the 1992
United
Nations Conference on Environment and Development
held
in Rio de Janeiro, the
Framework
Convention on Climate Change
was adopted as the basis for global political action. Under this convention,
new commitments to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases beyond the year 2000
were agreed in Kyoto in December 1997.
The
Kyoto Protocol, adopted by consensus by some 150 parties, stipulates that Annex
1 Parties (mainly industrialised countries) shall individually or jointly
reduce their aggregate emissions of a "basket" of six greenhouse gases to 5%
below 1990 levels in the period 2008-2012.
In
contrast to this political target, the scientific community speaking through
the voice of the
Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC) demands a much more substantial three-quarter reduction of the current
greenhouse gas emissions. This would require an almost complete phasing out of
fossil fuels, with significant (but overall not necessarily negative)
consequences for Europes economies.
For
its part the EU undertook to reduce by 8% over the next 15 years emissions that
cause global warming, compared with 7% for USA and 6% for Japan and Canada. The
reduction target is calculated using the Greenhouse Warming Potentials (GWP)
developed by the IPCC as "weighting coefficients", and thus is perhaps a first
example how a future "Pressure Index Climate Change" could be used to monitor
the implementation of the Kyoto process on the basis of one simple statistical
figure.
The
following indicators show how far the European Union has been successful in
reducing greenhouse gas emissions. NOx and SO
2,
although not greenhouse gases, have been added following the recommendations of
the Scientific Advisory Groups (SAG) on
Climate
Change,
because they play an important role in the scientific interpretation of global
temperature trends.
