Until last week, it was easy to be a proud Canadian in the Netherlands.
The last time we were faced with a global disaster approaching the scale of global warming, Canadians didn’t think twice about the cost or the sacrifices involved. Half a million Canadians fought their way across the mud of the Netherlands returning freedom and security. To this day, the Dutch appreciate Canadian willingness to join forces with the world.
But that may be over now that the Dutch have witnessed the shortsighted self-serving action of the Canadian government at the Sixth Meeting of the Parties to the United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP6) held in The Hague, November 13 — 24.
As a member of the Canadian delegation, I was embarrassed by the Canadian negotiating position.
Canada, along with the United States, appeared determined to ensure a Kyoto Protocol so full of loopholes as to be meaningless. In fact, many scientists have suggested that if Canada’s position was adopted, developed countries would actually be able to increase greenhouse gas emissions, totally undermining the 1997 agreement to reduce emissions.
The Climate Action Network (CAN), composed of close to 1,000 environmental organizations from around world, participates in the ongoing negotiations lobbying and promoting the most environmentally acceptable means of reducing emissions. Every day during the negotiations, the 200 or so members of CAN at the conference met to discuss the day’s events and the positions of the countries. The country with the worst position is recognized with a Fossil of the Day award.
Canada won the Fossil of the Day nine out of 10 days.
It was humiliating to sit there and hear representatives from around the world condemn Canada for its position day after day. Japan received a Fossil of the Day and two members of parliament were so embarrassed they hopped on a plane from Japan to straighten out Japan’s position. Members of the Canadian delegation, however, were actually giggling about Canada receiving the Fossil of the Day award.
COP6 was to be the session that established the rules for the Kyoto Protocol. Imagine you are in a room of 150 people, the group is handed a wooden stick and a ball, and you are told that in a few years everyone will be playing a brand new game called baseball. Your job is to write the rules for this new game that, by the way, is a professional sport with billions at stake.
Now the point of the global warming game is reducing emissions but, once the negotiating on the rules got started, Canada, the U.S. and others forgot all about the point of the game and instead concentrated on winning at the lowest cost. Along the way, the objective of averting a global environmental disaster became secondary to Canada’s economic demands.
So Canada went to The Hague arguing it should be allowed to claim credit for doing nothing different in forest management. Arguing nuclear power should be considered a “Clean Development Mechanism.” Arguing that there should be no limit on projects Canadian firms do outside of Canada and that they should be able to claim credit for reducing emissions there. Arguing emission reductions should become a complicated new futures market.
In the end, the European Union and the developing countries just could not compromise the Kyoto Protocol by accepting Canada’s demands. Faced with this embarrassing setback, Canada will be returning to negotiations in the spring.
Perhaps now that the government is feeling secure in its mandate, it will realize that the looming global disaster — with its incumbent economic, health and environmental impacts — outweighs our short-term demands for economic advantage.
In the meantime, I am still feeling embarrassed to be a Canadian.
(Bennett serves as Director, Atmosphere and Energy, for the Sierra Club of Canada.)
