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Assessment and Review under a 2015 Climate Change Agreement

In 2013, Parties to the UNFCCC were invited to prepare and communicate their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) under a 2015 agreement. Assessment and review of INDCs can help to ...

Side-payments: an effective instrument for building climate clubs?

Climate clubs have been suggested as a gateway to substantial reductions in global emissions. The club approach begins with a small number of enthusiastic countries. This paper asks under what conditions such clubs are likely to evolve into effective cooperation through side-payments to new members. The question is addressed through a range of formal thought experiments using numerical simulations. The model is calibrated using empirical data on countries’ emissions, GDP, populations, and vulnerabilities. It is simple and stylized, but allows for complex and dynamic interactions between actors. Basic equity considerations can be accommodated. The results indicate that side-payments’ theoretical potential for facilitating effective clubs is large. One or two large emitters can initiate a club that grows to cover a substantial share of global emissions if the global benefit–cost ratio for mitigation is around 3 or larger. The size of stable clubs is larger if new members contribute to making side-payments, and somewhat lower if equity considerations constrain the set of possible transfers. Side-payments’ effect is enabled by the large asymmetries between countries. Total side-payment flows range from tens to hundreds of billions of US dollars annually.

Climate Clubs: a Gateway to Effective Climate Cooperation?

This article has been published in a revised form in British Journal of Political Science https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123416000788. This version is free to view and download for private research and study only. Not for re-distribution, re-sale or use in derivative works.© Cambridge University Press 2017.

Fairness in the climate negotiations: what explains variation in parties’ expressed conceptions?

ABSTRACT How to differentiate efforts and obligations fairly between countries has been among the most central and controversial issues in climate negotiations. This article analyses countries’ fairness conceptions as expressed in position documents submitted during negotiations leading to the Paris Agreement. A regression analysis investigates which country characteristics predict relative support for three fundamental fairness principles – Responsibility, Capability and Rights (needs). The most consistent and important explanatory variable turns out to be whether a country is included in Annex I to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which lists developed countries. This finding is compatible with the hypothesis that parties invoke fairness principles with the goal of advancing their own interests: non-Annex I parties wanted this particular scheme of differentiation to be upheld in the Paris Agreement, whereas Annex I parties advocated its removal. Notably, the outcome in Paris omits references to Annex I. However, the Agreement does contain multiple references to ‘developed’ versus ‘developing’ countries, hence introducing a more subtle and ambiguous differentiation than before. Post-Paris, seemingly technical discussions have encountered ‘roadblocks’ that partially derive from how the Agreement resolved the issue of differentiation between developed and developing countries. It therefore appears that negotiators will have to continue to deal with this issue, even though it may take on a new dynamic now that the Annex I division has less force. Looking for pragmatic solutions tailored to each substantive agenda point will be likely more fruitful than discussions at the level of fairness principles aiming for one overarching solution. Policy relevance Arguments supported by reference to fairness principles play an important role in the discourse on international climate cooperation. Understanding how fairness conceptions vary between countries – and what background variables explain this variation – is crucial for understanding the negotiation process and outcomes, and for identifying which institutional arrangements are universally acceptable. This understanding is particularly relevant for current negotiations on the modalities for the ‘global stocktake’ – a process set up to assess collective progress every five years ‘in the light of equity and best available science’.

The effectiveness of climate clubs under Donald Trump

ABSTRACT On 1 June 2017, President Trump announced that the US intends to leave the Paris Agreement if no alternative terms acceptable to his administration can be agreed upon. In this article, an agent-based model of bottom-up climate mitigation clubs is used to derive the impact that lack of US participation may have on the membership of such clubs and their emissions coverage. We systematically analyse the prospects for climate mitigation clubs, depending on which of three conceivable roles the US takes on: as a leader (for benchmarking), as a follower (i.e. willing to join climate mitigation clubs initiated by others if this is in its best interest) or as an outsider (i.e. staying outside of any climate mitigation club no matter what). We investigate these prospects for three types of incentives for becoming a member: club goods, conditional commitments and side-payments. Our results show that lack of US leadership significantly constrains climate clubs’ potential. Lack of US willingness to follow others’ lead is an additional, but smaller constraint. Only in a few cases will US withdrawal entail widespread departures by other countries. We conclude that climate mitigation clubs can function without the participation of an important GHG emitter, given that other major emitters show leadership, although these clubs will rarely cover more than 50% of global emissions. Key policy insights The US switching from being a leader to being a follower substantially reduces the emissions coverage of climate mitigation clubs. The US switching from being a follower to being an outsider sometimes reduces coverage further, but has a smaller impact than the switch from leader to follower. The switch from follower to outsider only occasionally results in widespread departures by other countries; in a few instances it even entices others to join. Climate mitigation clubs can function even without the participation of the US, provided that other major emitters show leadership; however, such clubs will typically be unable to cover more than 50% of global emissions. Climate mitigation clubs may complement the Paris Agreement and can also serve as an alternative in case Paris fails.

From Lima to Paris, and Beyond : Options for Ex Ante Assessment of Intended Nationally Determined Contributions under the UNFCCC

A crucial question in the development of a new climate change agreement centres on the “intended nationally determined contributions” (INDCs) that parties have agreed to communicate before the COP ...

Replication Data for: The Club Approach: A Gateway to Effective Climate Cooperation?

Although the Paris Agreement arguably made some progress, interest in supplementary approaches to climate change co-operation persist. This article examines the conditions under which a climate club might emerge and grow. Using agent-based simulations, it shows that even with less than a handful of major actors as initial members, a club can eventually reduce global emissions effectively. To succeed, a club must be initiated by the ‘right’ constellation of enthusiastic actors, offer sufficiently large incentives for reluctant countries and be reasonably unconstrained by conflicts between members over issues beyond climate change. A climate club is particularly likely to persist and grow if initiated by the United States and the European Union. The combination of club-good benefits and conditional commitments can produce broad participation under many conditions.

Assessment and Review under a 2015 Climate Change Agreement: Lessons Learned and Ways Forward

In 2013, Parties to the UNFCCC were invited to prepare and communicate their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) under a 2015 agreement. Assessment and review of INDCs can help to ...

Operationalizing Equity in the 2015 Agreement : Report from Nordic-Belgian Workshop on 24.-25.10.2013 in Stockholm, Sweden

The Nordic Council of Ministers and the Government of Belgium organized a workshop on Operationalizing Equity in the 2015 Agreement on 24.-25.10.2013 in Stockholm, Sweden. The workshop aimed to foc ...