News | Climate Change

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Rich nations must outline firm plans on where finance to tackle climate change will come from. Only then will poor countries be willing to agree to structure carbon markets beyond 2012, outgoing UN climate chief Yvo de Boer told the Carbon Market Insights conference in Amsterdam today.

“There is huge suspicion among developing countries that rich nations will try to escape using public finance responsibility through the carbon market,” he said.

“It’s exactly that lack of clarity on financing that makes developing countries reluctant to talk about markets,” de Boer added.

The modest Copenhagen accord agreed in December did little to define the future of market-based mechanisms beyond 2012, when the current commitment period of the Kyoto protocol expires.
But the non-binding agreement did agree on the deployment of $30 billion of cash to tackle climate change in poor countries over the next three years, which will be scaled up to $100 billion a year by 2020.
Packaged Funds
De Boer said leaders of rich countries had yet to say clearly how much of the $100 billion commitment will come from public funds, either new or repackaged, or how much is expected to come from carbon market revenue.

He expected this year’s main UN climate summit in Cancun, Mexico, would deliver the framework for a legally-binding climate treaty to be signed at a later date.

“You don’t sign the lease on a house before you’ve seen it,” he told delegates.

More than 190 nations will make another attempt to reach a deal in Cancun from 29 November to 10 December.

But negotiations need to be scaled up over the course of the year for that process to be a success, de Boer said.

“I believe the process needs a big spanking,” he said.