UNFCC negotiations must determine the legal form, and architecture of the new global climate change agreement.
In order to build a durable and transparent outcome, Australia supports the development of a new legally-binding treaty. The future regime will be severely undermined if key countries do not support it. The legal instrument for the post-2012 outcome must therefore not only achieve consensus, but be capable of being ratified by all major economies, including the United States and China.
Australia has proposed innovative legal options. Our objective is to create an environmentally effective, flexible and durable legal architecture that enables all countries to contribute to, and benefit from, global climate change efforts. It would build on the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol.
There are two legal options currently being considered in the international negotiations. The first would bring all countries’ actions together under a single, new agreement to the UNFCCC to supersede the Kyoto Protocol. The second would take the form of an amended Kyoto Protocol to record developed country Parties’ mitigation efforts, and a separate new agreement under the Convention to record mitigation efforts of those countries without obligations under the Kyoto Protocol—developing countries and the United States.
A single treaty would have the advantage of being simpler to understand, with one set of institutions and rules.
National schedules
Australia’s key architectural proposal is to record actions to reduce emissions in a series of ‘national schedules’ annexed to the treaty outcome. We have developed and refined our ideas through a number of formal proposals to the UNFCCC in 2008 and 2009. The approach has generated support and interest from other countries and non-government organisations.
National schedules would provide a single, legally-binding vehicle to record efforts to reduce carbon pollution by both developed and developing countries. The transparent nature of national schedules is particularly important for a strong environmental outcome. It will promote ambitious national action and broader participation by giving countries confidence that their efforts will be reciprocated, and the means to compare their efforts with other countries.
National schedules would also provide the flexibility to recognise a range of contributions, retaining economy-wide targets for developed countries and allowing a broad range of actions by developing countries. These could include sectoral targets, emissions-intensity targets, national forest emissions levels, technology standards and other policies. This is particularly important for developing countries that are making mitigation contributions for the first time.
The schedules approach would provide a durable legal framework for the future. National schedules would enable an individual country’s efforts to be enhanced over time in line with its growing capabilities, without undermining the overarching legal structure.
More information on Australia’s legal architectural proposal can be found in our submissions on legal architecture for a post-2012 outcome made to the UNFCCC:
Shaping the legal architecture of the post-2012 global climate change outcome
Australia has led international discussion on the important issue of the legal architecture of the post-2012 global climate change outcome.
On 7 August 2009, Australia hosted a seminar on this issue. The seminar was the first of its kind, providing the opportunity for detailed discussion of the various proposals for post-2012 legal architecture that countries had formally submitted to the UNFCCC negotiations. More than 300 participants from developed and developing country Parties to the UNFCCC, non-Government organisations and civil society attended.
The Republic of Korea, Japan, Tuvalu, United States, the European Union, South Africa and Australia presented their proposals in detail. Representatives from the World Wildlife Fund and Greenpeace also presented a joint proposal. Other Parties and international think-tanks (including the Pew Centre for Global Change, the Institute for Development Studies, and the Centre for International Environmental Law) responded formally to the presentations.
Building upon the helpful discussions of the first seminar, Australia hosted a second seminar on 27 September 2009.
Australia opened discussions with a presentation on recognising and recording mitigation action in the post-2012 global climate change outcome. The European Union presented on long-term carbon planning; the Alliance of Small Island States on adaptation, especially the needs of the most vulnerable countries; the World Bank on markets: finance and investment flows; and New Zealand on new market mechanisms. The presentations concluded with a joint presentation by Indonesia and Australia on reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD). Other Parties (including the United States, Barbados, South Africa, Japan, Canada, Costa Rica and Brazil) and non-government organisations (including the Institute of Development Studies, the Nature Conservancy, Norton Rose and the World Wildlife Fund) responded to the presentations.
Both seminars were well received and highlighted clear areas of convergence amongst the various legal architecture proposals.
