Over 670 companies from around the world have signed “The Copenhagen
Communiqué“ in support of the United Nations climate change conference next month.
Here are the highlights:
• A global emissions cap and long-term
reduction pathway for all greenhouse gas
emissions and sources, for the period 2013
to 2050 (with interim targets). These targets
will need to be guided by science to ensure
global greenhouse gas concentrations are
stabilized below critical thresholds. When
stating this, we understand that there is an
emerging consensus behind an objective
of limiting global average temperature rise
to less than 2 degrees Celsius compared to
pre-industrial levels and that this will require
global emissions to peak and begin to decline rapidly within the next decade.
• Developed countries need to take on immediate and deep
emission reduction commitments that are much higher than the
global average, and which are backed up with credible strategies
to de-carbonize their economies. The developed countries need to
demonstrate that low-carbon growth is both achievable and desirable. They must also support the institutions and frameworks that
will provide the necessary financial and technological assistance to
developing countries.
• Developing countries will need to play their part by drawing up
their own emission reduction plans in line with their common but
differentiated responsibilities and capabilities.
• Advanced developing countries should continue to develop
low-carbon growth plans, building towards the adoption of appropriate and economy-wide commitments by 2020. Action at the
sector level will help accelerate the large-scale deployment of clean
technologies through robust funding solutions, technological transfer and capacity building.
• The least developed economies need additional assistance including increased and adequate financing, and expanded cooperation to help them adapt to and join the new low-carbon economy.
Key supporting elements of the agreement must include:
• A comprehensive global approach to emissions from international aviation and shipping, and a clear strategy to commercialize
carbon capture and storage, leading to widespread deployment.
• Credible measurement, reporting and
verification of emissions that are vital to
measuring progress against the objectives
of an effective climate treaty.
• Measures to deliver a robust global
greenhouse gas emissions market in order
to provide the most effective, efficient and
equitable emission reductions. It would be
comprised of a growing series of national
or regional “cap-and-trade” markets linked
together, in which the “caps” are brought
down in line with the targets that have been
adopted for emission reduction.
• A framework for developing countries
to accelerate the large-scale deployment of
clean technologies through robust funding solutions, leading to the
adoption of emission reduction commitments.
• An adaptation framework and funding mechanism to assist the
poorest countries and people who are particularly vulnerable to the
effects of climate change, while being the least responsible for the
problem. Adaptation funding needs to be additional, predictable,
stable and adequate. Governments need to assess their climate-related risk exposure and pool their analyses.
• A mechanism to Reduce Emissions from Deforestation and
Forest Degradation in Developing Countries which should ensure
substantial, predictable, results-based, and long term financial flows
to developing countries that achieve measurable and verifiable reductions in emissions from deforestation and forest degradation.
The Copenhagen Communiqué concludes:
“The problem of climate change is solvable – many of the technologies required are available today while others can be developed if
the right incentives are in place. The policies needed are relatively
clear, and the costs of transition are manageable, even in the current economic climate. The one thing we do not have is time.
“Delay is not an option.”
The Copenhagen Communiqué is an initiative of
The Prince of Wales’s Corporate Leaders’ Group on
Climate Change that is run by The University of Cambridge Programme for Sustainability Leadership.
