Enigin Update - Back from the Bolivian Brink at Cancún
"THIS is a new era of international cooperation in climate change," so claimed Mexican Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa after hours of climate change negotiations at the UN Climate Change Summit.
It was 5.30am Saturday morning as Espinosa held a press conference, her tough stance had bit by bit dismissed the only dissenting voice at the conference, Bolivia.
The rules of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the body guiding global-warming action, require a decision to be made by consensus, giving a veto to just any single inflexible country. It proved the downfall of the Copenhagen talks 12 months ago, when a handful of vetoes blocked the summit until a last-minute agreement was brokered by U.S. President Barack Obama.
On the scheduled last night, Friday night, a draft text of an agreement was prepared with every nation ready for a deal except Bolivia. The South American state would not budge.
"We reject this document," Bolvia's U.N. Ambassador Pablo Solon stated to the assembled representatives of over 190 nations, "and therefore there is no consensus for its adoption."
But unlike 12 months earlier Bolivia were isolated and friendless, allowing tough mexican diplomat Espinosa, who presided over the summit, to step and drive an agreement forward.
Finally, without any other opposition amongst the sleep-deprived delegates she declared the process finished, declaring: "The major results of this meeting will be issued as the Cancún Agreements," she said, to a standing ovation in the plenary hall. "This is a new era of international cooperation in climate change."
The world now has a new, and first, legal agreement on climate change in years. The agreement is modest, as there are no new binding pledges to cut carbon emissions, no hard figures on climate aid, and some of the most difficult decisions, including the fate of Kyoto Protocol, have been deferred to next years conference.
The progress? The world now, for the first time, has a legal instrument which commits both developed and developing nations, including major emerging economies such as China, to take climate action that is to be transparent and measurable.
"Obviously this package is not going to solve climate change itself, but it is an important step forward," said Todd Stern, the U.S. climate envoy, at the press conference on Saturday.
UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne said:
“A global climate deal is in the UK’s national interest and Cancun shows other countries also want to get on with getting an international deal. We’ve worked hard to bring countries together and the expectations have been exceeded.
“A global deal on climate change is now back on track. We’ve now got to use this momentum to make urgent progress and lock down that deal - a deal that will benefit our environment and our economies.”
The progress at the talks is good news for Enigin Distributors as a legal framework will drive further energy efficiency initiatives to fruition as it is one of the most effective ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Energy saving technology from Enigin allows decision makers to be able to manage and monitor their energy use and CO2 emissions along with load-side products to intelligently control energy use.
