Press Statement. Russia and Ukraine block progress on climate action in Lima

Lima, 12 December 2014. As climate talks in Lima are approaching the final hours, countries cannot agree on how to deal with the backlog of hot air under the Kyoto Protocol, equalling 13 billion tonnes of CO2. An unholy alliance between the Ukraine, Belarus and Russia are blocking progress on the second commitment period of …

The Joint Implementation offsetting mechanism is deeply flawed – time to consign it to history?

At the recent round of climate negotiations in Bonn in June, countries showed little interest in fixing the flaws of Joint Implementation (JI), the UN’s second largest offsetting scheme. The proposed new rules do little to tackle the severe quality problems that have dogged the scheme and led to very few genuine emission reductions. With the continued unwillingness of Parties to reform the system we see little reason why the JI should continue after the UN’s Kyoto Protocol ends in 2020.