Is mitigation Aotearoa New Zealand’s first priority?

When a man who civil society has nicknamed the “Death Star” calls your idea “the most interesting proposal on the table “, it’s time to take a good, long, hard look at yourself. It’s fashionable now to question the two degree target - even our Treasury has hopped on the trend - but US negotiator Todd Stern earned his nickname by saying that two years ago. Now even though he was way ahead of the curve setting trends like a diplomatic Nick Wooster, we need to remember that not all fashions are good. This is one that definitely will condemn us to a grim meathook future.

New Zealand’s lead negotiator Jo Tyndall describes mitigation as the “first priority as far as this Convention is concerned”. Responding to a concern that some states perceive the ongoing Durban Platform negotiations as “too mitigation centric”, New Zealand sets a clear priority for emissions reductions over all else. Despite recognising “there are a number of elements” in the talks and that “adaptation is hugely important”, New Zealand is concerned that the talks “are in danger of taking an eye off the ball” and letting mitigation agreements slip.

However, several commentators have already criticised New Zealand for its positions on the ADP. Even our own Treasury admits that the commitments we expect countries to bring to the table in Paris probably will not keep this century’s warming below two degrees. Grist, for example, has compared New Zealand’s position to the worst diet plan ever:

Imagine telling your friends you’ll cut back on eating ice cream, detailing for them your plan to cut your ice cream consumption — and then, a week later, telling your friends, around a mouthful of ice cream, that you may not be able to keep your pledge. Your decision not to stick to your plan, and to face your friends’ shaming, would be informed by how much you care about your friends’ opinions, and how addicted you are to ice cream — just as big emitters’ decisions to hit their targets would depend on how much they care about international opinion and their ability to shift off of fossil fuels.

Next week, we are due for our first Multilateral Assessment - a review of our economy-wide emissions reduction targets, where other countries question us on what we have done. China and the European Union in particular have levelled tough questions at us, which we have struggled to answer. It remains unclear how New Zealand will achieve its 5% emissions reduction target by 2020, let alone the higher 10-20% conditional target it set in Copenhagen five years ago.

Back home in New Zealand, Action Station have challenged New Zealand to “get serious on climate change”, suggesting the Minister Tim Groser is about to “about to undermine years of work towards international action on climate change”.

However, New Zealand’s submission on the legal form of next year’s Paris Agreement remains our most controversial proposal this year. Despite describing mitigation as a top priority, we have proposed a very flexible take on bounded flexibility, which would only bind countries to set their own targets and report against them. States would be free to chose from a menu of reporting options, and would be free to ignore their targets without any legal consequences. It is, as Grist suggested, no more than promising over and over to lose weight without ever committing to changing your diet.

Ultimately, our proposals would create a politically viable but scientifically suicidal outcome. New Zealand Youth Delegate Natalie Jones describes the proposal as “moving from the failure of pledge-and-review since Copenhagen to just pledge-and-no-review”. We are asking for countries to continue setting their own politically-determined targets without any scientific basis. Commitments are and will continue to be nationally determined - if New Zealand gets its way.

Jo Tyndall describes New Zealand as seeking a 2015 deal “that sets some clear parameters for national determination”, but - despite asking - I still have no idea what parameters we seek. We have ruled out any continuation of the current annex system, fairly identifying countries like Singapore with a GDP per capita well above New Zealand’s that are not in Annex One. Locking climate obligations in 2014 to economic development levels from 1990 is definitely deeply problematic. Ethically, adopting some form of legally binding equity reference framework would be ideal. Our own negotiators agree this would be “nice”, but I in turn agree with them that it would be politically untenable. What, then, are the “clear parameters” suggested? Our 2013 submission for “bounded flexibility” appears to be a codeword for flexible flexibility.

To achieve our two degree target - or even the more urgent and scientifically essential 1.5 degree target, we need to do something different. Even Todd Stern, the Death Star himself, now recognises that we must leave fossil fuels in the ground:

“It is going to have to be a solution that leaves a lot of fossil fuel assets in the ground,” he said. “We are not going to get rid of fossil fuel overnight but we are not going to solve climate change on the basis of all the fossil fuels that are in the ground are going to have to come out. That’s pretty obvious.”

Maybe in two years time, we’ll catch up with Death Star Stern. But for now, New Zealand continues to open up new oil exploration. Voluntarism won’t stop that, and nor will bounded flexibility built on a voluntarist core. If we can’t accept annexes or an equity reference framework, then let’s build something new. That’s why campaigns like ActionStation’s are so important. If you haven’t signed on, please do!