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Last Update: May 21, 2008
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Historic Agreement Reached on Ozone and Climate Change
Montreal – September 21, 2007 – (9pm local time)- “We have a historic deal!” proclaimed Nick Nuttal, spokes person for UNEP at the Montreal Protocol’s 20 th Anniversary Meeting of the Parties. In an unprecedented agreement, industrialized and developing countries have agreed to obligatory commitments to accelerate phase outs of HCFCs (hydrochlorofluorocarbons), chemicals harmful to the ozone layer, but also a cause of global climate warming.
At the closing hour of the conference, the 191 delegates were ironing out final details in the global agreement which will have monumental benefits for the planet, and particularly to slow global climate change, a fortuitous benefit that was unforeseen in earlier understandings of how the ozone related to the world’s temperature and climate.
The details of the agreement, which were laid out during 5 intense days of negotiations, over who phases out what and how much , who pays , and under what timetables , were to be made public Saturday by Canadian Minister of Environment John Baird and UNEP Director Achim Steiner.
Developing countries, including Argentina, Brazil, Switzerland and several low-lying pacific island nations” brought new scientific findings to the table nearly nine months ago, when new research showed the added benefits of ozone replenishment to slowing climate change, and proposed an urgent need to accelerate HCFC phaseouts over 10 years instead of 40. This would have, according to studies, a potential of quintupling the most optimistic objectives set by the largely failed Kyoto Protocol. Several countries came in later behind the phaseout scheme, including the US, Europe and China, and helped tip the political balance to secure an agreement over the proposal.
Argentina, one of the most aggressive supporters in favor of the phaseouts was instrumental in informing negotiating ozone delegations and environmental ministries over the last several months of the large climate benefits that could be reached by linking the Montreal and Kyoto Protocols. Argentina, Brazil, the US, and surprisingly China, played a key role in helping steer negotiations during the Meeting of Parties in Montreal, when the deal seemed stuck due to negotiating teams’ inability to get beyond technical hurdles. But finally, a historical agreement was reached in the final hour.
The 191 countries agreed unanimously to accelerate HCFC phaseouts from 2009. The agreement is unique in that not only does it focus on ozone recuperation, but also aims specifically at reversing climate change, and will potentially achieve 5 times the expected climate change benefits under the Kyoto Protocol under the most optimistic but unlikely scenarios. Considering the difficulties the Kyoto Protocol has had in achieving its objectives, the new Montreal agreement is even more significant.
Brian Mulroney, former Canadian Prime Minister said, "It doesn't really matter whether the process is called Kyoto or something else, as long as we are addressing the urgency of global warming."
Many point out to the unique linking of two treaties and distinct sets of global environmental objectives under the Montreal Protocol (on ozone) and the Kyoto Protocol (on global warming), as an indication that we are seeing a maturation of the world’s global environmental governance system, and a sign that collaborative global environmental agreements can be reached. Many have long stressed the need of better coordinating the planet’s hundreds of environmental treaties, amongst one another but also with existing economic and industrial promotion policies, which would help construct a more environmentally, socially and economically rational regulatory framework for sustainable development.
The Montreal Protocol was signed in 1987 by 191 countries, and successfully achieved the reduction of some 95% of the world’s ozone depleting substances called CFCs, however, still others, like HCFCs persist, and are ironically produced and financed through perverse incentives established by the Kyoto Protocol. This agreement will help eliminate this inconsistency and make an important contribution to addressing our planet’s present climate emergency.
More Information
For more information please contact:
Daniel Taillant + 54 9 11 6729 5466 ( jdtaillant@cedha.org.ar )
Ana María Kleymeyer + 54 9 11 4974 0587 ( akleymeyer@ambiente.gov.ar )
