Environmentalists Find Way to Close Forest Emissions Loophole in Copenhagen

Copenhagen – Environmental groups have put forward the solution to the forest emission loophole that loomed large at the UN Climate Talks last week. This loophole is almost as large as the current emission reduction targets of the Kyoto Protocol.

With little time left before Heads of State arrive, the environmental groups are working to ensure the environmental integrity of forest accounting systems for both developed and developing countries.

“The developed countries brought questionable accounting methods to Copenhagen; these proposals would create an unacceptable precedent for the proposed mechanism to reduce emissions from tropical deforestation,” said Dr. Jason Funk from Environmental Defense Fund, “Countries need to stop creating special rules and acknowledge that a forest is a forest, no matter where it stands.”

Using all official historical data provided by developed countries, environmental groups have calculated and proposed new baselines for measuring changes in greenhouse gases from logging and other forest activities.

“This solution is simple, transparent and fair,” said Chris Henschel, with the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society. “We are proposing that developed countries use their historic data from 1990 to 2007 as a basis for measuring changes in forestry emissions. The atmosphere will like this, and so will our children.”

The groups are calling on all countries to toss out reference levels in the current draft negotiating text and adopt historical baselines in their place. “It’s an objective basis for accounting. If countries do not accept these reference levels, they risk creating more hot air,” said Melanie Coates from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.

“We anticipate support for this proposal,” said Henschel. “Switzerland expressed openness to a similar baseline in its most recent submission. France is pushing for a historical baseline within the European Union.”

Many developed countries have come to Copenhagen asking the World to ignore planned increases in greenhouse gas emissions and erase them from the books. “They came looking for a big logging loophole and there’s absolutely no place for that in an ambitious climate change agreement,” said Dr. Toyoyuki Kawakami from Rainforest Action Network.

“We don’t have much time left, but we have enough time to fix this problem,” said Paul Winn, Greenpeace.

# # #

Contact: Chris Henschel, Chair, CAN Working Group on LULUCF, Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society

chenschel@cpaws.org, +45 5148 7341