Round Up

Viewpoints

Aug. 12, 2019

Viewpoints present policy proposals, considered opinions, and commentary by distinguished policymakers, leaders from business and non-governmental organizations, and scholars. The Harvard Project on Climate Agreements does not advocate any specific climate change policy proposals. Statements and views expressed in Viewpoints are solely those of the authors and do not imply endorsement by Harvard University, the Harvard Kennedy School, or the Harvard Project on Climate Agreements.

For more information on this publication: Belfer Communications Office
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While U.S. media reports blame Iran and its drone attacks for “pouring gasoline on a region that is already in flames,” there's a lot more to the story, and “most of it reflects poorly on the United States.”
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Photovoltaic panels rotating

Policy Brief - Harvard Project on Climate Agreements

Treaty Design and Duration: Effects on R&D, Participation, and Compliance

    Author:
  • Bard Harstad
| January 2013

Climate policy is complicated. For a treaty to be beneficial, one must think through carefully how it will work, once it is implemented. Crucial questions include the following: How should an international treaty be designed? Should one negotiate commitments for a five-year period, or for much longer? Assuming that the treaty specifies aggregate or country-specific emission caps, what should these caps be and how should they change over time? How should the agreement be updated once policymakers, scholars, and the public learn more about the severity of the climate-change problem, or about the effects of the policy? Can the treaty be designed to encourage investments in "green" abatement technology or renewable energy sources? Finally, how can one motivate countries to participate and comply with such an agreement?

Cattle graze in front of wind turbines of the Spanish utility Endesa in the Eolico Park, Spain, Aug. 3, 2006.

AP Photo

Policy Brief - Harvard Project on Climate Agreements, Belfer Center

Toward a Post-2012 International Climate Agreement

    Author:
  • Fulvio Conti
| March 2010

Negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) at Copenhagen in December 2009 did not produce a new international treaty with binding emissions commitments, but have defined a roadmap for dealing with global climate change in the post-2012 era. As countries continue to pursue new models for global agreement, it will be important to learn from the weaknesses of past approaches, while building on positive aspects of the experience with the Kyoto Protocol so far.

Service technicians fill a truck with liquid CO2 at Schwarze Pumpe in Spremberg, Germany, 9 Sep 2008. Vattenfall Europe inaugurated a pilot unit for a coal-fired power plant with CO2 capture and storage, the world's first of its kind.

AP Photo

Policy Brief - Harvard Project on Climate Agreements, Belfer Center

Technology in the UN Climate Change Negotiations: Moving Beyond Abstraction

    Author:
  • Morgan Bazilian
| September 2, 2009

This brief considers the technology negotiations of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) within the wider context of low-carbon energy technology. In doing so, it focuses on how technology issues can be effectively embedded within a potential agreement at the 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) in Copenhagen. The paper asserts that the negotiations must be conducted with cognizance of national decision-making processes and competing priorities. It puts forth a series of framing topics in order to more explicitly explore the large technology "ecosystem". It concludes that the most appropriate area for international cooperation on technology under the UNFCCC lies in the direct provision of human and institutional capacity building with a focus on the least developed countries.