The San Jose Mercury News published an op-ed by CPI’s Executive Director Thomas Heller about the shape of future international climate negotiations in a rapidly developing world:
The world has changed significantly since climate talks began two decades ago in Rio. It is no longer shaped by two rival superpowers. New economies — China, India, Brazil, Korea, Indonesia — have grown in size and standing.
These new players define their political and economic status in the global order without relation to the old poles of developed and developing, state and market, the West and the Rest. Pushed by a will to lead instead of follow and enabled by the public spending that comes with fast economic growth, these new players increasingly are implementing their own policies, blazing the path that any international accord will ultimately reflect.
This interview is from SEE magazine on newsstands in Brazil. Translated from the Portuguese by Climate Policy Initiative.
Thomas C. Heller, Stanford Law Professor, one of the world's most renowned advisors in environmental policy, says that emerging countries will lead the transition to a more sustainable economy
The new world order is green
Veja, January 13, 2012
Professor Thomas C. Heller, Climate Policy Initiative and Stanford University, is one of the world’s most influential experts on environmental policy. A member of the UN panel of experts who estimated the effects of climate change and shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with former Vice President Al Gore, Professor Heller has been asked to assist in the formulation of sustainability programs in ten out of ten emerging countries. His pragmatic approach is music to the ears of governments in Brazil, China, and Indonesia. The Chinese plan to reduce carbon emissions and the Brazilian law that cut transfers of federal funds to municipalities that deforest are examples of programs that Climate Policy Initiative, a nonprofit institution founded by Heller and funded by financier George Soros supported. Professor Heller says: “It is up to the emerging countries to lead the transition to a new world order where being sustainable will be a tremendous competitive advantage.”
Just when I was beginning to doubt that voluntary action by major emitters could truly reduce pollution, a new study [subs. req.] has shown that voluntarily slowing commercial container ships near-shore (and switching to low-sulfur fuel) can reduce some major pollutants by up to 90%.
Container ships approaching land from the open ocean bring a number of environmental problems with them, like acid-rain causing sulfur dioxide, lung-damaging particulate matter, and haze-forming black carbon, all emitted within a few miles of people living near shipping lanes and ports.
TAGS: air, board, california, carb, dioxide, matter, noaa, particulate, resources, shipping, sulfur, voluntary_action