The US, Europe, Australia, Japan, Russia, Canada, can shut off all of their emissions, and global warming would still happen,reducing warming by about 1C otu of 4C.

That the developing world has a small share of historical emissions doesn’t change the fact that the emissions there are growing so much that global warming will not be reduced unless emissions there are reduced substantially.

The US Congress is debating putting nuclear, clean coal and free emission permits for industries, now how are you going to ask India, China to tax their coal power plants and shift to renewable energy sources. Australia’s case is THE worst. The only major thing that Prime Minster Rudd has done is the ratification of Kyoto Protocol since then no national efforts have been taken towards reducing carbon emissions. Australia has the world’s highest per capita emission levels. Since his election there have been talks of a carbon trading law but nothing concrete has happened, today again the Australian lawmakers rejected the carbon law.

Efforts from the developed countries have been extremely disappointing.

Also, the ‘nondeveloped’ countries are the ones with more emissions now.
For example, according to Wikipedia’s list of carbon emissions, the US is 20.2%, and the EU 13.8%. If you add in Russia, Japan, Canada, South Korea, and Australia, you get 49% of global emissions in 2006.

If Canada agreed to a 50% cut below 1990 levels for her emissions by 2020, it would probably reduce global emissions by one half of a percent or even less.

By that time, the ‘developed countries’ will probably account for just 25-30% of world emissions. Any action that reduces global warming requires severe drops in emissions from developing countries, which are light years ahead of their 1990 emissions levels. Changes in developed countries are a drop in the bucket.

[The only reason 1990 is still a standard base year is that it was the one used in Kyoto, so it's easy to compare to. Developing countries need to reduce emissions too, but developed countries are more responsible for the damage that's already been caused, as it's the cumulative buildup of GHG rather than the instantaneous emission levels that matter. So over the long run, we're the guiltiest ones. -Kate]

Either way, these numbers are meaningless, since the chances of such cuts happening in ten years is very remote.

It isn’t that much of a change, since emissions from 2001-2008 were almost flat, the 90s had a small gain. I suspect a 20% cut below 2005 levels means a 12% cut below 1990 levels.

My own local member gets his science from WUWT, knows all their talking points.

If we will not even admit a problem then it would appear that most of our adaption is going to be post event. We won’t build a new Sydney Airport untill planes are trying to land on the water.

Combine this with the (sadly, hollow) ultimatum at the Commonwealth summit in Trinidad/Tobago earlier this week – where calls were made for Canada’s suspension from the commonwealth over its climate positions. For the record, if acted upon, this would put Canada in such esteemed company as Pakistan, Zimbabwe, and Uganda (all of whom have been suspended over human rights issues).

Just recently, as well, George Monbiot weighed in – first with a letter in the Globe and Mail to all Canadians, and then with an article of his own on the subject. (Note that the article isn’t up on his website yet; it’s his custom to include citations when publishing on his personal site, but he leaves them out of his space-limited newspaper columns.) He’ll be engaged in a debate (with Elizabeth May on his side) against Nigel Lawson and Bjorn Lomborg tomorrow on a similar issue (and sadly, since I’m teaching, I’ll have to miss it…).

All of this means diddly squat to Harper, of course (how much you want to bet he’ll be looking for a Tim Horton’s in Copenhagen?). In fact, a friend of mine observes:

I could see Harper dropping the monarchy (which would help him consolidate even more power in the PMO) before listening to foreign influences, not to say that will sell here though.

The LA Times reports 4%.

The EU has agreed to at least 20%.