Pablo Suarez, Guest Blogger
Another in a series from the Triple Crisis Blog and the Real Climate Economics Blog on the Cancún Climate Summit.

Economic policy shapes most international negotiations, including those under United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). However, negotiators often face serious obstacles to understand the full complexity of available policy instruments. A case in point is insurance schemes and climate change negotiations. Insurance schemes have the potential to support adaptation and climate risk management [read more]: Article 4.8 of the UNFCCC and Article 3.14 of the Kyoto Protocol require Parties to consider mechanisms, including insurance, to meet the specific needs and concerns of developing countries in adapting to climate change. Two proposals have been submitted to that effect. Yet progress has been relatively slow, in part due to difficulties in explaining the concepts in ways that engender both understanding and trust among climate negotiators.

Nonlinearities, feedbacks, “side effects” and trade-offs, inherent in risk financing, are not easy to grasp by non-expert audiences exposed only to text, presentations and other unidirectional approaches. How can we devise a communication platform that can successfully convey the complexity, possibilities and risks of complex policy instruments, in this case climate-related insurance systems?

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Janot Mendler de Suarez, Guest Blogger
Another in a series from the Triple Crisis Blog and the Real Climate Economics Blog on the Cancún Climate Summit.

One of the themes of Oceans Day at Cancún was climate financing on the frontlines– the 183 coastal countries, including 44 SIDS, ­already battling the escalating costs of the global climate crisis.

How do the numbers stack up against the Copenhagen price tags for adaptation in developing countries? The ‘Fast-start’ up to $30 billion/year by 2012 followed by $100 billion/year by 2020 looks a lot like the $70-100 billion/year estimate from the 2010 Economics of Adaptation to Climate Change Adaptation (EACC) report from the World Bank and UN– the most comprehensive study to date.

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Kristen Sheeran, Guest Blogger
Another in a series from the Triple Crisis Blog and the Real Climate Economics Blog on the Cancún Climate Summit.

This week the world stands by as international negotiators in Cancun appear to be writing the post mortem for the Kyoto Protocol. It seems likely that an alternative track first proposed in Copenhagen – the Copenhagen Accord – will replace the top-down U.N. centered approach to climate change that has characterized international climate negotiations since the early 1990s. Many view the Copenhagen Accord as a major set-back to global efforts to stabilize the climate system. Others see it as a realistic alternative to the Kyoto framework which failed to induce the participation of the U.S., now the world’s second largest emitter, and exempted major emitters like China and India from reductions.

The Copenhagen Accord signifies a major shift in both the tenor and structure of international cooperation on climate change. Here are some of the major changes and potential consequences as I see them.

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Kristen Sheeran, Guest Blogger
Another in a series from the Triple Crisis Blog and the Real Climate Economics Blog on the Cancún Climate Summit.

Alan AtKisson, Guest Blogger
Another in a series from the Triple Crisis Blog and the Real Climate Economics Blog on the Cancún Climate Summit.

The movement of ideas through the international system is a mysterious thing. Consider, for example, the circuitous journey of the “Global Feed-in Tariff”: this is the idea of guaranteeing the purchase of renewable energy by electricity utilities, supported by a subsidized price. What is happening with this potential global climate-game winner?

The feed-in tariff model (to simplify, “tariff” means “price support” in this case) has worked brilliantly to spread wind and solar energy in countries like Germany and Spain. Too brilliantly, worry some experts, who point to grid over-load risks. Other experts say that risk is remote. But in the rest of the world, “too much solar energy” is hardly the problem. Despite the amazing, astonishing spread of the stuff, and the steady drop in prices, wind and solar energy are still (says conventional wisdom) “too expensive” compared to “conventional” sources like coal and natural gas.

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Graciela Chichilnisky, Guest Blogger
Another in a series from the Triple Crisis Blog and the Real Climate Economics Blog on the Cancún Climate Summit.

The Kyoto Challenge

Most people know that the United Nations Kyoto Protocol limits global carbon emissions. It is the only international agreement we have for resolving potentially catastrophic climate change. But few people know how it works. Few people are aware that the Kyoto Protocol has already funded US$50 Billion in clean technology projects in developing nations through its Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). Since the Protocol became international law in 2005, this funding took place in a short period of five years, and continues growing. During this five year period, the carbon market of the Kyoto Protocol grew from zero to US$165 billion in annual trades, and the projects funded by the CDM achieved a real impact. These projects have decreased carbon emissions by the equivalent of 40% of EU emissions.[1]

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