The God Species_ How the Planet Can Survive the Age of Humans - Mark Lynas [126]
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, was aghast. “Why can’t we mention even our own targets?” she demanded, looking pale and tired. Kevin Rudd, then prime minister of Australia, objected in even stronger terms, banging his microphone in frustration. France’s Nicolas Sarkozy and Britain’s Gordon Brown both made clear that these targets should stay. This was a “red line” for them all, as the 80 percent target had already been agreed at an earlier G8 meeting.2 But it needed to be restated properly in a climate-change agreement if it was ever going to happen. Even Brazil, formally an ally of China in the negotiations, pointed out that the Chinese position was illogical—you can remove your own targets, but not someone else’s. Speaking for the Maldives, President Nasheed reminded China that removing this all-important number would spell doom for low-lying and vulnerable island nations like his. With the prime minister of Grenada, on behalf of the Association of Small Island States, he insisted that the text should also retain a target for keeping global temperature rise below 1.5 degrees Celsius—against yet another Chinese objection.
Playing for time, Mr Yu asked for a break to consult his “superiors”—begging the inevitable question of why China had sent a relatively junior official to negotiate in person with the President of the United States and other world leaders. Indeed, the implied snub was not lost on President Obama, who complained that it would have been better if he had been able to hold talks with someone actually empowered to make decisions. But there was nothing anyone could do, and the meeting broke up—at close to midnight, on the final evening of the conference—with the draft text still not agreed. I headed outside for some fresh air with President Nasheed, pursued by camera crews desperate for news. We said nothing, for there was nothing to say.
When the leaders reassembled, it was clear at once that the game was over. Neither the 80 percent cut for rich countries nor the mid-century 50 percent cut, survived the night. The final Copenhagen Accord, stitched together as a face-saving measure by 2 a.m., might still have been marginally better than nothing—but scientific analysts quickly warned that it would be unlikely to hold the global temperature rise below 3 or even 4 degrees higher than preindustrial levels. When it was presented to the entire conference for adoption, chaos ensued. Some delegations whose leaders had not been invited to the heads of state meeting furiously denounced the draft accord as having been stitched up without their knowledge or approval. The majority, including the Maldives, were prepared to accept it as just one more small step along a much longer road, but such pragmatism failed to win over the angriest and loudest voices of opposition. It was midday on Saturday, twelve hours after the conference had been scheduled to close, before it was decided that the Copenhagen Accord would only be “taken note of” by the assembled nations—and would therefore have no legal force within the UN climate process. It was the worst kind of compromise: one that satisfied nobody. People were not just disappointed, they were furious. And rightly so.
Copenhagen failed for many reasons. Principally, there were bitter divisions between rich and poor nations, each of whom blamed the other for failing to take leadership. Boxed in by its own domestic political paralysis, the United States was unable to make the concessions other states needed to see to prove its good faith. China, and also India, were flexing their muscles for the first time—showing beyond doubt that global agreements could not be made any longer without their support and cooperation. China was the big story: Here was