treaty will now come into effect
Today the russian cabinet has sent the Kyoto accords to the russian parliament to be ratified. With that ratification the majority of the planet and polluters on the planet will have finally signed up and the treaty will come into effect.
This brings the total number of countries who have ratified, approved or accepted the accords to 126 out of 137, with Australia, indonesia and the US being the noticeable exceptions. The accords commit many of those countries who have signed (primarily the developed countries) to reduce their greenhouse emission to various levels of their 1990 emissions (92% for the EU, 100% for Russia).
This ends a long battle by supporters of Kyoto to gain the required ratifications to proceed. Russia is responsible for nearly half the greenhouse emission that the US is and therefore it's ratification was a key requirement for the accords to proceed. Admittedly due to the contraction in it's economy after the collaspe of the Soviet Union it will not have any major challenges in meeting it's targets. It also played it for the maximum and has used the issue to gain EU, Japenese and Chinese support for it's accession into the World Trade Organisation. But at the end of the day Russia is now on boards and the accords are now coming into force.
What annoys me about all of this is that the US still refuses to sign the accord. 92% of the countries on the planet, representing over 90% of the population have agreed to a treaty, but the US refuses to sign. It would have to reduce it's greenhouse emissions to 93% of 1990 levels. Arguements of "It'll hurt our economy" or "But the developing world doesn't have to reduce levels" don't work when you look at almost every other developed nation reducing their levels. Why should the US, who are responsible for over 1/4 of all greenhouse emissions on the planet be allowed continue as they see fit and ignore the wishes of the planet, who themselves are trying to reduce their emissions? They has been a colossal failure in responsiblity here, both on the US to take responsibility for it's pollution and on the rest of the world to make the US realise the importance of tackling this problem.
I look forward now with hope that the accords will start the reversal in pollution that is so required. The next stage of the accords will be to set targets for developing nations, such as China and India. Such levels will be far lower than the levels western nations have reached, and the sooner they are set the better. Once all nations have target levels then the process of reducing those levels further can start.
paul.