The Paris Agreement establishes a new multilateral architecture guiding countries’ climate change efforts under the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Parties are currently negotiating more detailed rules and procedures for implementing the agreement, including provisions addressing transparency, accounting, …
The Paris Agreement’s provisions on mitigation-related information and accounting are intended to promote transparency and environmental integrity, and play a central role in the regime’s architecture. They contain two basic elements: first, general obligations on parties, and second, authorizations to …
Like other treaties, the Paris Agreement includes provisions spelling out the manner in which a party may choose to exercise its right to withdraw. This note summarizes these provisions; relevant provisions of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC); …
In fashioning the new international climate change agreement to be adopted later this year in Paris, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)1 must address a range of legal issues. This brief outlines some of the …
U.S. acceptance of the new climate agreement being negotiated under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) may or may not require legislative approval, depending on its contents. U.S. law recognizes several routes for entering into international legal …
The success of ongoing negotiations to establish a new global climate change agreement depends heavily on the agreement’s acceptance by the world’s major economies, including the United States. The new agreement is being negotiated under the United Nations Framework Convention …
Fridtjof Nansen Institute Climate Policy Perspectives 13 October 2014 A primary goal of the Durban Platform negotiations should be to develop an agreement that will maximize reductions in greenhouse gas emissions over time. Achieving this objective will be a function …
Governments are aiming to produce a new global climate change agreement in 2015 in Paris. Past outcomes of the UN climate negotiations—like many other multilateral environmental regimes—consist of packages containing different types of instruments. It is likely that the outcome …
This paper explores options for a hybrid approach in the 2015 agreement, focusing in particular on mitigation efforts, rather than the broader array of issues under consideration in the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform (ADP), such as …
The international community is in the midst of shaping the next stage of the global climate effort—working both within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and through the broader “regime complex” that has grown alongside it. Within …
In 2011, parties to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) opened a new round of negotiations aimed at delivering a global climate agreement in late 2015 in Paris. The decision launching the Durban Platform talks spelled out some …
The Durban Platform talks, aiming for a new global agreement in 2015, present an opportunity to assess and strengthen the international climate change effort. Since launching the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change two decades ago, governments have tried both …
A number of established multilateral regimes offer important avenues for climate mitigation efforts complementary to those of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UN FCCC ). Tackling discrete dimensions of the climate challenge in regional, sectoral and other global …
On December 31, 2012, the Kyoto Protocol’s first commitment period will expire. Unless states agree to a second commitment period, requiring a further round of emissions cuts, the Protocol will no longer impose any quantitative limits on states’ greenhouse gas …
The 2009 Copenhagen climate summit may in retrospect prove a critical turning point in the evolution of the international climate change effort. For a decade and a half, the principal aim under the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) …
Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and parties to its related legal instrument, the Kyoto Protocol, are engaged in dual track negotiations aimed at reaching a new agreement or agreements to address global climate change. This …
The Pew Center released a report outlining options for measurement, reporting, and verification of countries’ actions in a post-2012 global climate agreement at a side event held during the international climate negotiations in Bonn, Germany.
With the approach of 2012, and the expiration of the initial greenhouse gas targets under the KyotoProtocol, governments are grappling with how best to advance the international climate effort in the years beyond. The central challenge is as clear as …
In recent years, sectoral approaches have received renewed attention and are among the options proposed for the post-2012 period. In its report, International Climate Efforts Beyond 2012, the Climate Dialogue at Pocantico identified sectoral approaches as one of the potential …
With the prospect of new climate negotiations starting in 2005, experts, stakeholders, and governments have begun to assess a range of options for advancing the international climate change effort beyond 2012. This paper offers a broad survey of alternative approaches …
The report is a compilation of six “think pieces” on core issues in developing an effective international response to global climate change. Working drafts of the papers were the focus of workshops in China, Germany, and Mexico. More than 100 …
This working paper identifies potential scenarios for the linkage of U.S. and international climate strategies; describes how emerging national and international emissions trading regimes will shape the context within which such linkages could take place; and examines issues that must …
This working paper examines some of the potential implications for U.S. business of the Kyoto Protocol’s entry into force – in particular, the effects of the U.S. decision to stay out of the Protocol. The Bonn and Marrakech meetings adopted …