OPINION/COMMENTARY

History Repeats Itself

Kyoto cannot come into effect until the number of ratifiers includes those who account for 55 percent of the carbon dioxide generated by those countries listed in an Annex to the Protocol. This seems sensible, until we understand how limited that group is. It does not include developing countries like China, India and other high growth economies in East Asia which today account for over 40 percent of the carbon dioxide generated by human activity. Since they are the world's fastest growing producers of carbon dioxide, that share is steadily increasing. So this Protocol is triggered when countries who at best account for 30 percent of the world's human-generated CO2 accede. Russia has triggered this threshold. It is obvious that if only a minority of producers of CO2 cut back, overall, global emissions will continue to increase.