Copenhagen: UN Climate Chief Weighs in On Climategate, EPA Ruling, Work Ahead

COPENHAGEN — The United Nations top climate official Yvo de Boer weighed in on a variety of high-profile issues at a press conference at the Copenhagen climate negotiations on Tuesday morning, including the leaked climate science emails, how the ruling from the Environmental Protection Agency yesterday that greenhouse gases are dangerous to health would affect the Copenhagen talks and what needs to happen for success in Copenhagen.

Similar to the statements made by much of the science community and climate negotiators at the Copenhagen conference, de Boer said that the science presented by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change “is rock solid.” The IPCC’s findings (the fourth version), which some critics are questioning in light of the leaked emails, is based on 2,500 scientists completing their own independent research, which went through a peer review process and then was analyzed and put together by the IPCC, explained de Boer. De Boer said while the email leaks don’t change the science itself, it’s beneficial to go through the process of investigating the leaked email issue and see what happened. There is an investigation going on by the police, by the University of East Anglia (where the security breach occurred) and by the IPCC, said de Boer.

Called Climategate by many in the media, the leaked email issue has reared its head at the opening of the Copenhagen climate talks and is proving to garner a significant portion of attention from the press, from concerned negotiators like those from Saudia Arabia, and from critics looking for fodder to support climate change skepticism (this site and many others focused on issues of climate change have seen a burst of attention from climate change skeptics).

But Climategate was just one of a sweeping range of issues upon which de Boer gave his opinion this morning. De Boer also weighed in on domestic U.S. policy. He said he sees the EPA’s recent findings that greenhouse gases are dangerous to human health (opening the gate to the EPA regulating greenhouse gases) as “the stick behind the door” for the Obama administration. The passage of the U.S. House climate bill wasn’t easy and its passage through the U.S. Senate will be difficult, said de Boer, so the EPA ruling is something that the administration could fall back on if legislation stalls.

For business, however, de Boer said they should pray for some kind of market mechanism like the cap and trade system under consideration in Congress as “taxes and regulation tend to be less efficient and more expensive than market approaches,” said de Boer. At a press conference held by the European Union shortly after de Boer’s meeting, representatives of the E.U. also “welcomed” the EPA’s decision as “another possible instrument that the administration could use.” But the E.U. representatives said history has shown that it is questionable whether it is a wise decision to exclude the House and Senate from such a politically sensitive issue.

On the issue of what do the negotiations need to succeed, de Boer said before the heads of state arrive in the last few days of the summit, the negotiators now need to buckle down and get to work. “Get the basics done in the first week and make sure the foundations are in place.” In response to a question posed from the media about how large players like the U.S. could very well come to the meeting with an already decided upon target (with few plans to negotiate), de Boer said that in talks with negotiators he’s heard that the targets that China, the U.S. and even the E.U. have put forth could be improved upon. “African and the least developed nations are saying that no one’s targets are good enough and we all know rich countries’ targets are not good enough to get us to the climate mitigation that is needed,” said Boer. “We still need negotiations to maximize the greenhouse gas emission reductions.”

In terms of financing for the most vulnerable nations, we need developed countries to gives us pledges for what they will contribute, said de Boer. “Not a collective promise, but individual announcements from countries. We also need an effective tracking mechanism to see that industrialized nations are meeting those financial commitments.” The UN and de Boer have maintained that the most vulnerable nations need $10 billion per year from developed countries to address immediate climate change adaptation and mitigation over the next several years.

De Boer plans to hold media updates throughout the Copenhagen negotiations to focus on key issues, topics and milestones. We’ll keep you updated.

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