Michael de Laine

By Michael de Laine, Copenhagen, 24 March 2009

The international scientific conference on climate change has sent comments on six overall themes to Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen. The Danish government will host COP15, the UN Climate Change Conference, in December.

Following a successful international scientific conference on climate change, hosted by the University of Copenhagen earlier this month, has sent comments on six overall themes to Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen. The Danish government will host COP15, the UN Climate Change Conference, in December, and will hand over the conclusions of the university’s conference to the COP15 decision-makers ahead of their climate summit.

More than 2,500 delegates from nearly 80 countries attended the University of Copenhagen conference, and the conclusions from their debates and deliberations - the comments on six overall themes - will be published as a full report in June.

The six themes are: climatic trends, social disruption, long-term strategy, equity dimensions, inexcusable inaction, and meeting the challenge.

* Climatic trends: Recent observations confirm that, given high rates of observed emissions, the worst-case scenario trajectories (or even worse) projected by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are being realised.

For many key parameters, the climate system is already moving beyond the patterns of natural variability within which our society and economy have developed and thrived. These parameters include global mean surface temperature, sea-level rise, ocean and ice sheet dynamics, ocean acidification, and extreme climatic events.

There is a significant risk that many of the trends will accelerate, leading to an increasing risk of abrupt or irreversible climatic shifts.

* Social disruption: The research community is providing much more information to support discussions on “dangerous climate change”. Recent observations show that societies are highly vulnerable to even modest levels of climate change, with poor nations and communities particularly at risk.

Temperature rises above 2 deg. C will be very difficult for contemporary societies to cope with, and will increase the level of climate disruption through the rest of the century.

* Long-term strategy: Rapid, sustained, and effective mitigation based on coordinated global and regional action is required to avoid “dangerous climate change” regardless of how it is defined. Weaker targets for 2020 increase the risk of crossing tipping points and make the task of meeting 2050 targets more difficult.

Delay in initiating effective mitigation actions increases significantly the long-term social and economic costs of both adaptation and mitigation.

* Equity dimensions: Climate change is having, and will have, strongly differential effects on people within and between countries and regions, on this generation and future generations, and on human societies and the natural world.

An effective, well-funded adaptation safety net is required for those people least capable of coping with climate change impacts, and a common but differentiated mitigation strategy is needed to protect the poor and most vulnerable.

* Inaction is inexcusable: There is no excuse for inaction. We already have many tools and approaches – economic, technological, behavioural, management – to deal effectively with the climate change challenge. But they must be vigorously and widely implemented to achieve the societal transformation required to decarbonise economies.

A wide range of benefits will flow from a concerted effort to alter our energy economy now, including sustainable energy job growth, reductions in the health and economic costs of climate change, and the restoration of ecosystems and revitalisation of ecosystem services.

* Meeting the challenge: To achieve the societal transformation required to meet the climate change challenge, we must overcome a number of significant constraints and seize critical opportunities. These include reducing inertia in social and economic systems; building on a growing public desire for governments to act on climate change; removing implicit and explicit subsidies; reducing the influence of vested interests that increase emissions and reduce resilience; enabling the shifts from ineffective governance and weak institutions to innovative leadership in government, the private sector and civil society; and engaging society in the transition to norms and practices that foster sustainability.

“At the conference organised by the University of Copenhagen, scientist have presented decision-makers with the latest scientific results,” said Connie Hedegaard, Denmark’s Minister of Climate and Energy. “Unfortunately, some of the facts are even more disturbing than in the fourth report from the IPCC, the cornerstone in the negotiations.”

Hedegaard said the results will increase awareness about the urgent need for decisive and ambitious action on this matter.

“We need a truly global agreement in Copenhagen later this year to address the challenge of our heating globe,” she said. “The current economic crisis is no excuse for inaction. On the contrary, it is a chance to set a new course and steer our economies towards great opportunities. The cost of inaction is far greater than the price of taking action now. This is the world’s chance to rethink business as usual. In fact: The policies needed to address climate change and revitalise our core infrastructure are the very same policies that can help rebalance and revitalize our economies.”

The Danish Minister of Climate and Energy added, “The only growth we can afford in the years to come will be green growth. Now it’s time for the world to apply these tools and take action on the challenge ahead of us.”