Climate change is a relatively new topic in international diplomacy. See how it became one of the world’s most debated topics and learn about the milestones in the fight against further warming.
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Demonstrators protest against Australia's climate politics in 2006. Australia recently ratified the UN's Kyoto Climate Protocol, while the U.S. remains the odd one out (Photo: Reuters) |
1988: World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Programme jointly establish the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The IPCC does not carry out its own research, but publishes reports on climate change that summarize international consensus on the problem.
1990: The first report of the IPCC finds that the planet has warmed by 0.5 degrees Celsius in the past century. The IPCC warns that only strong measures to halt rising greenhouse gas emissions will prevent serious global warming. This provides a scientific basis for UN negotiations for a climate convention. Negotiations begin after the UN General Assembly in December.
1992: At the UN “Earth Summit” in Rio de Janeiro, 154 nations sign the Climate Change Convention and agree to prevent "dangerous" warming from greenhouse gases. The convention sets initial targets for reducing emissions from industrialized countries to 1990 levels by the year 2000 – one of many failed targets.
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Graphic (click on the image to enlarge)Kyoto Emission Targets |
1995: In its second report, the IPCC first acknowledges that global warming might be man-made. It predicts further temperature rise between 1°C and 3.5°C. The first real UN climate summit is held in Berlin and decides to draft an international climate treaty, the future Kyoto Protocol.
1996: Scientists warn that most industrialized countries will not be able to stabilize emissions at 1990 levels by the year 2000. The U.S. agrees for the first time to legally binding emissions targets.
1997: At theUN climate summit in Kyoto, Japan decides on legally binding emissions cuts for industrialized nations averaging 5.4 percent to be met by 2010. This is what became known as the Kyoto Protocol. Though U.S. representatives signed the treaty, the Senate back home overwhelmingly rejected it, demanding first “meaningful participation” from developing countries in reducing emissions.
1998: The hottest year in the hottest decade of the hottest century of the millennium.
2001: The third IPCC report presents a worst-case scenario where the average global temperatures increase by 6 degrees Celsius within a century. A climate summit is convened in Bonn and most countries decide to continue with the ratification process.
2003: Europe experiences the hottest summer in at least 500 years, the first extreme weather event attributable to man-made climate change. Officials later estimate 30,000 fatalities as a result of exterme heat waves.
2004: Russia ratifies the Kyoto Protocol in exchange for EU support for Russia's admission in the World Trade Organization.
2005: With more than 55 percent of carbon dioxide emissions in industrialized countries now covered by the Kyoto Protocol, the first phase of making emissions cuts begins.
2007: The fourth IPCC report predicts sea levels rising at least 18 cm up to 59 cm by 2100, and finds that greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere have not been so high for over 650,000 years. Negotiations on a post-Kyoto agreement that would come into force from 2013 formally begin at the UN Climate Summit in Bali. Al Gore and the IPCC receive the Nobel Peace Price for their contribution to the fight against global warming.
2008: Countries will meet at a UN climate summit in the Polnish town of Poznan to continue drafting a follow-up treaty to the Kyoto Protocol. America elects a new president. Hopes are high that he would end America’s policy of opposing mandatory CO2 emissions cuts.
editor: Thilo Kunzemann
publishing date: June 16, 2008
