Saturday, December 15, 2007

Bali's Failure

I just don't get this. All the papers are talking about a historic agreement in Bali -- even the British papers -- but to me it seems like a massive failure. It would have been a great agreement -- if this were 1987. But all they've agreed to is to delay emissions targets by at least two more years and to keep on talking. Big whoop. The US is already starting to act squirrely again.

The world needs to start reducing its carbon emissions and it needs to start doing it 20 years ago. Second-best would be if it started do it now.

The same issues and barriers are going to be at Copenhagen 2009 as were at Bali 2007. Granted, Bush will be gone, and perhaps a better administration will be in place. Perhaps not. But the one definite thing is there will be ~50 billion more tons of CO2 in the atmosphere two years from now.

Like I said, I just don't get this. Only in fantasyland can agreeing-to-some-other-day-agree be considered significant.

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