Proposition 54K2175

Projet de loi portant assentiment à l'Accord de Paris, fait à Paris le 12 décembre 2015.

General information ¶

Submitted by

MR Swedish coalition

Submission date

Nov. 22, 2016

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

UN convention international agreement climate change

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

Groen CD&V Vooruit Ecolo LE PS | SP DéFI ∉ Open Vld N-VA LDD MR PVDA | PTB PP VB

Contact form ¶

Do you have a question or request regarding this proposition? Select the most appropriate option for your request and I will get back to you shortly.

Discussion ¶

Dec. 21, 2016 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

I would like to refer to my written report.

The floor is yielded to Mr Crusnière to speak on behalf of his group.

Like any multilateral agreement, the Paris Treaty is a balance. And in a balance, there are always positive points and disappointments. But overall, we have strong reasons to welcome the Paris Agreement.

We can welcome the level of ambition set at COP21. The agreement contains the goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees. This is more ambitious than the initial goal of COP21 that was only aimed at keeping warming below the 2 degree threshold.

The Paris Agreement also provides for provisions to increase the capacity of countries to adapt to global warming to ensure the transition to a low-carbon society and to accelerate climate financing.

We are pleased to see the level of ambition increase with this agreement. But we also know that the measures taken to combat global warming are unfortunately insufficient. Currently, the national contributions to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions announced by the various countries put the planet on a trajectory of warming well above 1.5 degrees.

According to the IPCC, global emissions should be reduced by 40 to 70 percent by 2050 to avoid uncontrollable climate packaging. Strong measures will need to be taken by all countries in the world to be up to the level of ambition set by the Paris Agreement.

The Paris Agreement is therefore a starting point, a first step that must require regular follow-up. In this regard, we want the European Union not to be behind in this process and to evaluate and then strengthen its policies to combat global warming.

Dear colleagues, the industrialized countries are the main responsible for the accumulation of greenhouse gases. However, it is developing countries that suffer the worst consequences. Global warming aggravates inequalities between industrialized and vulnerable countries. For the PS, climate justice must be at the heart of international agreements.

At the Copenhagen Conference in 2009, the industrialized countries set the goal of mobilising $100 billion a year by 2020 to support developing countries. The Paris Agreement confirmed that amount of $100 billion.

We must now move from words to deeds. We must implement this commitment to enable vulnerable countries to cope with the consequences of warming.

The aid provided must also enable these countries to ensure their social development without taking the same polluting paths that we have taken in the past. It is a matter of climate justice and social justice.

After the Paris Conference, the world is a little better. However, the planet is not saved. This agreement is a framework. It is now up to us to implement it.

After the pathetic episode of burden sharing, our country must move to the upper speed. For the PS, the federal and the Regions must concrete the Paris Agreement and establish a roadmap for climate change. This roadmap will contain intermediate targets to ⁇ , by 2050, a reduction of at least 80 to 95 % of Belgian greenhouse gas emissions. Only under these conditions will we be able to meet the objectives set out in this Treaty.

In conclusion, I would like to bring a note of hope. As the international political situation has deteriorated in recent years, the agreement reached in Paris in November 2015 has been a formidable signal of hope. This agreement shows that 195 countries, with their differences and their own interests, are able to unite and defend a common cause.

There are many crises in this world. They are climate, but also social, security and humanitarian.

To deal with these multiple and interconnected crises, we need dialogue and solutions at the international level.

The Paris Agreement shows that this is possible. The Paris Conference has shown that multilateralism can work when the political will is at the meeting. The Paris Agreement gives wrong to all those who look cynically at the global dialogue that the UN allows. It is a huge success!

I hope that this can serve as an example to address the many challenges facing international politics.

On 12 December 2015, Belgium, as one of 195 countries, signed an ambitious, binding and equitable global climate agreement. It was a historic moment: 195 countries have committed to keeping global temperature rise below 2 degrees Celsius compared to the pre-industrial period and even to pursue a limit to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Those goals, colleagues, are a minimum minimum to counter a permanent climate change, which is disastrous for our planet. There is absolutely no time to lose. Even China and the United States, the two largest polluters in the world, thought so. So we can be happy that the agreement is there and that we are part of it.

But there is a pointing. On November 4, 2016, Belgium was a bit on the sideline when history was written in connection with human efforts to combat climate change. We, colleagues, were too busy with an inter-federal robbery fighting burden sharing 2013-2020. Hopefully tomorrow the effort law, which aims to ratify the Paris climate agreement, will finally be approved. Better late than never.

Ladies and gentlemen, let it not be the final stop. There is still a lot of work in the store. I look forward to your energy vision, the Inter-Federal Energy Pact, the negotiations on burden sharing, the burden sharing, for the period 2020-2030. Again, the time is pressing. It remains my conviction that our country should and can play a leading role, especially in a changing global context, where climate deniers and populists are getting more and more for the word. It is now up to you and also to the government to show that we too can be ambitious in terms of stopping global warming with all its consequences. In any case, we promise you critical support.

Mr. Speaker, we are witnessing an important moment for Parliament and, in particular, for Ecolo-Groen members as we see an ecological project taking place at the heart of the parliamentary debate. Moreover, we are talking about a project politically and universally recognized by 195 countries. It is very rare that so many different nations unite around one goal. Here, it was the case. France, in the person of Laurent Fabius, has managed to bring together ⁇ two hundred countries with one and the same goal. Putting around the table countries such as Saudi Arabia, a major oil producer, Russia, the United States and, of course, a group of states such as the European Union to reach an agreement in a human and environmental goal is a success that should be commended.

The aim is therefore to limit global temperature rise to less than 2 °C and, if possible, to 1.5 °C compared to the pre-industrial era. This is an ambitious goal. It is not enough to wish for it, it is still necessary to do everything to ⁇ it. We are at this stage.

Belgium currently emits 0.32% of global greenhouse gas emissions. This rate will be reduced drastically in the coming years. As other colleagues have recalled, 80 to 90 percent of our CO2 and greenhouse gas emissions must be reduced. We are far from burden sharing. This will be implemented in consultation with the regions. There is work. We are discussing the Paris Agreement and the reduction of greenhouse gases, while at this time in Brussels, where we are gathering, we are experiencing a peak of pollution. But no measures to combat this pollution and these massive emissions of greenhouse gases and pollutants emitted by heating and car are not taken in the very place we are talking about.

In the federal, Minister Bellot drastically decreased the dotation of the SNCB. We know that reducing greenhouse gas emissions in terms of transport is crucial if we want to succeed in the energy transition to a less-carbon economy. If we do not offer a chance to the alternatives to the private car, i.e. public transport – the train occupying a crucial place there – we will not succeed in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

There have been many discussions in the committee. There are a number of negative points in this agreement, including the exception for air transport. However, it is well known that major airlines, including the Brussels National Airport, foresee very broad margins of progression and expansion. If we do not take air transport into account in the calculation of greenhouse gas emissions, we could miss the goal of reducing the temperature rise to 2 °C or even 1.5 °C. It is very unfortunate.

We, environmentalists, have questions about the additionality of aid. I will come back briefly because there have been discussions on this subject as well. It is clear that the fight against climate change is the fight against climate change; development aid is development aid. If it is to put resources, it must be put on both sides at the same time. One cannot use the fact that we are practicing development aid in the countries of the South which, by chance, also involves projects to combat climate change to consider it a budget to fight climate change. If one wants to conduct a real policy in this area, it needs to be granted a specific budget. If, by chance, these aid benefits in terms of cooperation in the development and development of renewable energy in the Southern countries, the better. Additional and complementary aid. We cannot use the development cooperation budget to fight climate change. This is a new topic that requires new and additional funding.

I will conclude with a topic that remains at the heart of the problem: the aircraft is not subject to the accounting of greenhouse gases. Now, the European Union (and our state that chose this policy) has entered into a vast round of negotiation and multiplication of free trade agreements with a whole series of regions of the world, starting with regions very far away from our coasts and our airports. This means that if the European Union is here in a policy of reducing these greenhouse gases in the fields of transport, heating, industry, it will simultaneously initiate the drafting and signing of agreements that will increase the transport of goods by waterways and by air.

This is contradictory. The objective of this free trade agreement, with all regions of the world, including very remote ones, is to increase the transport by boat and by air, i.e. the use of oil to be able to transport these goods. There is therefore a contradiction. The solution, according to the European and Belgian Greens, is to give priority to our goal of fighting climate change over our commercial goal, that is, that what should guide our action is to give priority to a human objective of defending our humanitarian interests, our interests of citizens of the world rather than defending the particular interests of multinational companies that could benefit from these treaties.

That is why we have doubts. Of course, the goal achieved is absolutely unimaginable. It is not just about supporting the ratification of this agreement, but above all to implement all policies to make this agreement real and effective. That is why we will vote for the ratification of this agreement.

Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to add a few words to the comments of my colleagues. This bill ratifies the Paris Agreements that have already entered into force. This is a step in the right direction even though there is still a lot of work to be done to fulfill the commitments made in Paris to limit global warming to 1.5 °C.

At Marrakech, the Parties to the Convention reaffirmed their determination to combat global warming. As the Belgian climate platform recalls, the main result of COP22 is the opening of two years of intense work to reach key decisions in 2018 that will enable the implementation of the Paris Agreement.

We must therefore welcome the ratification by Belgium of the Paris Agreement but above all we must look to the future. We know that the European Union and all major emitters will need to rethink their rising ambitions to combat global warming in the coming years. Regions and the federal state must quickly agree on the 2030 National Climate-Energy Plan as well as their long-term vision. This must be consistent with the Paris commitments. The year 2017 will have to assemble, as soon as possible, the indispensable decisions at the Belgian level.

This is what I strongly wish for. We will have to be able to implement all the steps, from the beginning of next year, in committee and in plenary session.

The Paris Agreement was approved almost unanimously as a historic agreement.

It is true that this agreement contains progress, but, in my opinion, there is really no reason to rejoice. Indeed, if compared to what was likely to be done, the agreement is positive, compared to what should be done, we can almost talk about disaster.

While ambitious principles and objectives have been announced and adopted by all, it is necessary to show clarity and be aware that all concrete and binding measures that would have allowed to hope to ⁇ these objectives have been methodically avoided in the final text.

Nevertheless, between climate and fossil industry, we have to choose, and quickly because we can see that warming is going faster than expected. We have passed 1°C and the use of fossil fuels is responsible for 80% of current anthropogenic CO2 emissions. These emissions must be reduced by at least 40% by 2020, and by 85% by 2050 in industrialized countries.

According to the IPCC, 80 percent of the currently known reserves of coal, oil and gas must remain buried underground, to have two out of three chances of remaining below the 2°C warming threshold. To stay below 1.5°C, according to new reports released in November, it is 100% of the reserves that must remain buried underground. Therefore there is urgency.

However, in the final text of the Paris Agreement, we succeed in the exploit of never mentioning fossil fuels. The words oil or coal do not appear there. Renewable energy is mentioned only in the preamble. In addition, no specific target is specified in terms of emissions reduction.

It can be said that this is a victory for the fossil energy giants and all those who massively invest in it, like the big banks. Even those who have sponsored millions of times COP 21 invest $670 billion each year in searching for new fields. Of the seven largest multinationals in the world, six are major energy groups. The interests at stake are huge!

What is in the content of the Agreement, on the other hand, is the promotion of a series of “false solutions” in the logic of a form of green capitalism. Market solutions with the logic of carbon pricing, and solutions for selling and buying CO2 allowances. These mechanisms are not real alternatives, in our view, but allow governments and ⁇ to find ways not to reduce their emissions because they are often cheaper.

As Canadian writer and activist Noamie Klein said, “There is a war between climate and capitalism.”

This does not mean that nothing has been achieved. The recognition of the urgency, collective and differentiated responsibility of a number of important general principles and objectives are in agreement, of which the need to aim 1.5°. These are real advances, especially since they have been achieved primarily thanks to the pressures from below, the mobilisations of Southern countries, trade unions and the climate movement as a whole.

This mobilization is growing and, we have seen it in Paris despite the very difficult post-attack climate in which the COP took place, here lies hope. Let’s be clear, hope is not in the majority politics. While the Paris Agreement recognizes the enormous and pressing climate challenges we face, the majority continues, as if nothing, its policies not only anti-social – that’s another aspect – but also anti-ecological.

For example, a policy at the service of Electrabel with the extension of nuclear power plants and a lack of subsequent investments in renewable energies. For example, unprecedented cuts in public transport with 3 billion less for the SNCB - today we see the degradation of this mode of transport, in any case, everyone who takes the train sees it. Trade agreements such as CETA are also continuing to be concluded, which, in fact, fosters an increase in long-distance intercontinental trade, which is not really good for the climate.

I could also mention the non-compliance with the commitments in terms of "climate" financing and the fact that the minister resumes the speech of the FEB. The 2030 commitments are difficult to meet, even though they are not ambitious enough to address climate challenges. All this in a Belgian framework imprinted with blasphemy between competent authorities, as if global warming stopped at linguistic or regional borders. We will vote in favour of the Paris Agreement, but do not consider this positive vote as a support for your policy.

Mr. President, I thank you. I was fortunate to participate in this debate by replacing my colleague, Deputy Prime Minister of Foreign Affairs, for the text that should implement in our legal order the great Paris Agreement.

I hear that this agreement is not perfect and that in many aspects it is not going far enough. Some important sectors are omitted – I refer to Mr. Hellings’ intervention – but it has the merit of existing. It has managed to put around the table, universally, 195 countries to project forward and draw together the path that should lead to the drastic reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in the world. This event is important enough to be emphasized.

I am pleased that, through the transition into plenary session, we will be able to ratify part of this great international agreement that is still to be passed before various assemblies in the coming weeks, and then allow the Minister of Foreign Affairs to bring the instrument of ratification to the Secretariat General of the United Nations, proof of Belgium’s commitment. What appears to me as the most important, beyond the criticism that is not too severe and which has the merit of highlighting all that remains to be done – and there is so much work – is this path that we will have to concrete between 2021 and 2030.

Next year, from January, if Europe communicates to us the percentage of efforts that will be due to us, we will have to concrete these efforts in the context of reducing greenhouse gases, increasing renewables and therefore any measure that contributes very objectively to reduce greenhouse gases in our country, in Europe but also in the world.

I hear that it is said and blamed that development cooperation must be distinguished from climate financing. You know that climate financing is part of this burden sharing agreement that has taken time to be born. It took about six years for this government and other regional governments to conclude it.

It is a good thing that it has been concluded since on 6 December – it is a coincidence but it is still worth reminding – I had the opportunity to pay to each level of power the ETS quota that belonged to it for the period 2013-2020, which will allow each level to concrete by measures the routes that we have, on the one hand, concluded for the period 2013-2020 which is not yet completed and, on the other hand, those that we will conclude for the future years.

Now back to the international financing. In this context, one of the measures of the political agreement of 4 December 2015 was the participation in Belgium’s international financing for the fight against global warming. Some say that 50 million euros is not enough and that it must necessarily be an additional funding. First of all, it is an additional funding, it has been said, which will total after five years, 250 million, which is still not bad!

Regarding development cooperation and related policies, I understand that we really want a very strong financial input not only on development cooperation but also on international financing, without recycling of one measure against the other. Nevertheless, I have asked to list all the policies carried out within the framework of development cooperation, in order to show that an impressive series of these policies actually contributes to the fight against global warming in countries with which we work in that framework.

I know well that, technically, this is not what some people want to see, but it must be remembered. When you see the amounts funded, whether you add them to the fight against global warming, you realize that Belgium, our small country, is making huge financial efforts to engage internationally in the fight against global warming.

The agreement will live. I will end with this, Mr. Speaker. In 2018, the most ambitious countries will meet. They are already preparing this work in order to list concrete actions and, above all, to finalize the financing they intend to engage to reach the level of $100 billion US. Among the most ambitious countries, Belgium is one of them.

I know that through our climate service, which is very competent and internationally recognised, we contribute enormously to the development of this concrete path. We are one of the countries that are strongly committed. I count on your help to broadly convince, with your interventions, all members of my government – I have already begun to do so – that the financing of these policies is increasingly supported and that we really have, at the Belgian level, a concrete commitment to make our planet viable for future generations.

I thank you for your interventions and your support. I wish you good luck with the Paris Agreement. I thank you.