1. UNFCCC, Kyoto Protocol,
Montreal Protocol
By: Renelle Gordon
Rushell Rousseau

3. What is UNFCCC?
• UNCFFF [United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change (UNFCCC or FCCC])
 An international environmental treaty negotiated at
the United Nations Conference on Environment and
Development (UNCED), informally known as the Earth
Summit, held in Rio de Janeiro from June 3 to 14, 1992.
 The objective of the treaty is to stabilize greenhouse
gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that
would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference
with the climate system.

4. So how did they attempt to do this?
• The treaty itself sets no binding limits on
greenhouse gas emissions for individual
countries and contains no enforcement
mechanisms. In that sense, the treaty is
considered legally non-binding. Instead, the
treaty provides a framework for negotiating
specific international treaties (called
"protocols") that may set binding limits on
greenhouse gases. The main UNFCCC treaty is
the Kyoto Protocol, which has become much
better known than the UNFCCC itself.

5. Goals of the UNFCC
• ‘stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations
in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent
dangerous anthropogenic human induced
interference with the climate system. Such a
level should be achieved within a time-frame
sufficient to allow ecosystems to adapt naturally
to climate change, to ensure that food
production is not threatened and to enable
economic development to proceed in a
sustainable manner’

6. UNFCC is:
• Recognizing that all countries, especially developing
countries, need access to resources required to achieve
sustainable social and economic development and
that, in order for developing countries to progress
towards that goal, their energy consumption will need
to grow taking into account the possibilities for
achieving greater energy efficiency and for controlling
greenhouse gas emissions in general, including through
the application of new technologies on terms which
make such an application economically and socially
beneficial,
• Determined to protect the climate system for present
and future generations.

7. UNFCCC is:
• Recognizing the special difficulties of those countries,
especially developing countries, whose economies are
particularly dependent on fossil fuel production, use
and exportation, as a consequence of action taken on
limiting greenhouse gas emissions.
• Affirming that responses to climate change should be
coordinated with social and economic development in
an integrated manner with a view to avoiding adverse
impacts on the latter, taking into full account the
legitimate priority needs of developing countries for
the achievement of sustained economic growth and
the eradication of poverty.

8. What is the Kyoto Protocol?
•
It is the first legally binding treaty aimed at cutting emissions of the
main greenhouse gases believed to contribute to global warming.
More than 150 nations signed it back in December 1997 at a meeting
in Kyoto.
• But they left much of the detail about how it would be implemented to
future talks. These dragged on, reaching a crisis in The Hague in
November 2000, when the US and the European Union failed to agree
and talks broke down. George W. Bush was installed as President soon
afterwards, and announced that he was pulling the US out of the deal
altogether.
• Since the US is the source of a quarter of emissions of greenhouse
gases that was a big blow, but the other nations decided to carry on
and they finally reached agreement in Marrakech in November 2001.

9. Aim of the Kyoto Protocol:
The Kyoto protocol was drawn up to set
specific targets for reductions in greenhouse
gas concentrations in the global atmosphere.
Emission restrictions were made for the rich
countries of annex 1 - the biggest greenhouse
gas producers, and also the countries most
able to cut emissions. Targets range from an 8
per cent cut for the EU to a 10per cent
increase for Iceland, depending on the
individual country.

10. Aim of the Kyoto Protocol cont.
• Annexe 1 also includes several 'transition
countries', like the Russian federation, whose
economies still need some development and are
allowed 'a certain degree of flexibility'. The
emission reduction targets for these countries
were laid out in Annexe B. To become legally
binding the protocol had to be ratified by at least
55 countries which between them account for at
least 55 percent of the total 1990 GHG emissions
of developed countries.

11. Details of the Kyoto
Protocol
• A theme which runs through much of the
Kyoto protocol is for countries to cooperate.
Sharing both advances in GHG technology and
science. The greatest achievement of the
protocol so far is to get so many countries
together and talking on a central issue.

12. Details of the Kyoto
Protocol
• A cautionary note in the protocol is to be
careful of the wider impacts GHG reduction
schemes may have. Some may be too costly to
maintain for the benefit they provide, others
may cause an unreasonable degree of
disruption to the populace, industry etc.

13. Details of the Kyoto
Protocol
• Article 3.4 caused a great deal of argument as
it did not specify what could be constituted as
a valid sink or source and what 'additional
activities' meant. The US took this article to
mean that it could count forests which already
existed in its sinks, other countries argued that
this was not fair and would allow countries
like the US to do relatively little.

14. Emissions Trading
• A key feature of the protocol is the agreement on the
use of some form of emissions trading. If introduced
the trading system should allow the holder of a 'credit'
the emission of a specified amount of GHG.
• A tradable carbon credit unit called AAU's (Assigned
Amount Units) has been proposed which would
represent one tonne of CO2 emissions.
• The advantages of this trading are that it drives
countries to better efficiency in their own greenhouse
gas emissions. However, this is probably the most
contentious of all the' flexibility mechanisms'.

15. • There is a worry that some rich countries will simply 'buy off'
the GHG they produce and not take any action themselves.
The idea of a 'cap on the amount of trading has been
suggested, but has produced even more argument'.
• Taken a step further, per capita emissions have been
discussed as a Utopian way to be fair to all.. Maybe one day.
But these credits will only have value for reductions made in
the commitment period 2008-2012.
• Despite this some traders are already speculating in 'carbon
credits' and its worth all businesses being aware of where
they would stand in a world of 'carbon credits'. Farmers for
instance may be sitting on 'pots of carbon gold' in the form of
the potential of their land as a carbon sink.

16. Montreal Protocol
• The Montreal Protocol is the first worldwide
agreement designed to protect human health
and the environment against the adverse
effects of the depletion of the stratospheric
ozone layer. The protocol is administered by
the United Nations Environment Programme
(UNEP), which maintains the list of ozone-
depleting substances that are targeted for
control practices, reductions, or total phase-
outs.

17. Importance of the Montreal Protocol
• The 1987 Montreal Protocol - restricting the use
of ozone-depleting substances - has helped both
to reduce global warming and to protect the
ozone layer.
• The benefit to climate achieved by the Montreal
Protocol alone at present greatly exceeds the
initial target of the Kyoto Protocol.
• The effects of the Montreal Protocol on climate
will become smaller in the future, while
emission reductions after 2012 under the Kyoto
Protocol will potentially have much larger
effects on climate.

18. • Note that while the Montreal Protocol mandates an end to
the production and consumption of the major CFCs, halons,
hydrobromofluorocarbons and methyl bromide by 1996,
there continue to be substantial releases of some of these
substances in the U.S. (based on industry reports to TRI).
• Implementation of the Montreal Protocol is dependent on
national regulation, and in the U.S. the EPA has focused on
eliminating production of Class I ozone depleting
substances by the treaty's phase-out dates.
• Use of previously produced stocks of ozone depleting
substances was not banned as of January 1, 1996, and
releases to the atmosphere continue. Facilities reporting
releases of Class I ozone depleting substances may have
been legally using previously produced stocks or operating
under essential use exemptions, or they may have been
operating illegally. EPA is currently actively enforcing the
CAA restrictions on uses of ozone depleting chemicals.

19. Ozone layer and the Montreal
Protocol
• Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and other ozone-depleting
substances are now globally recognised as the main cause
of the observed depletion of the ozone layer. Molina and
Rowland’s recognition of the potential of CFCs in depleting
stratospheric ozone for the first time in 1974 provided an
‘early warning’. Concern was further heightened by the
discovery of the ozone hole over Antarctica in 1985. The
1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the
Ozone Layer formally recognised the significant threat of
ozone-depleting substances to the ozone layer and
provided a mechanism to reduce and phase out the global
production and use of these compounds. This ozone
protocol represents a landmark in the successful reduction
of global production, use and emissions of ozone-depleting
substances. According to research the ozone layer is now
starting to recover.

20. Dual benefit
• According to research led by the
Netherlands Environmental Assessment
Agency, the Montreal Protocol has helped
both to reduce global warming, and to
protect the ozone layer.
• Research also reveals that the contribution
of the ozone-depleting substances to
radioactive forcing would most likely have
been much larger if the link of these
substances to stratospheric ozone depletion
had not been recognised in 1974 and
allowed by a series of regulations.

21. Dual Benefits
• Without the reductions achieved under the
Montreal Protocol, the amount of heat
trapped due to ozone-depleting substances
would be about twice as high as present
levels. The savings in trapped heat are
equivalent to the current increase, built up
during about 10 years of growth in carbon
dioxide concentrations.

22. Dual Benefits
• The climate protection already achieved by
the Montreal Protocol alone is far larger than
the reduction target set for the first
commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol. On
the other hand, the effects of the Montreal
Protocol on climate will become smaller in the
future since the ozone-depleting gases are
being phased out.

23. Future benefits
• Additional climate benefits of significance in comparison to
the Kyoto Protocol reduction target could be achieved by
new actions under the Montreal Protocol.
• These actions are destroying CFCs present in existing
applications (refrigerators, foams), limiting the production
of not fully halogenated fluorocarbons (HCFCs), and/or
implementing alternative gases with lower global warming
potentials.
• Additional emission reductions after 2012 are being
negotiated in the framework of the Kyoto Protocol. Such
reductions have potentially much larger effects on climate
than the additional climate benefits of the Montreal
Protocol.

24. Sources
• http://www.pbl.nl/en/publications/2007/The_
importance_of_the_Montreal_Protocol_in_pr
otecting_climate
• http://www.ghgonline.org/kyoto.htm
• http://www.earthorganization.org/articles/Lib
rary/THE_POLITICS_OF_CLIMATE_CHANGE_EX
PLAINED/default.aspx
• http://www.environbusiness.com/cchange/co
nvention.html