Copenhagen Blog - Finally arrived on the train, but will negotiations stay on track

Written by George Lyon and published in the Stremie blog on Thu 17th Dec 2009

I've just arrived at the Bella Centre in Copenhagen for the United Nations climate change conference. After a nineteen hour train journey across the snow covered tracks of northern Europe it is a welcome relief to arrive at the destination I've been building up to since the European elections in June.

Of course, others have been building up to this Summit for much, much longer. It is now twelve years since the Kyoto conference - a city that has become synonymous with international efforts to combat climate change, but also the ultimate failure of those efforts.

The problem with the Kyoto Protocol was that it omitted the two world's largest CO2 producers in the United States and China. The former because of Congressional alarm at pesky environmentalists dictating terms to the world's only remaining superpower which had the potential to harm continued economic growth. The latter because it was still considered a 'developing' or non-annex 1 country and so was not bound by the targets set.

Without the participation of the two giants of the new century, Kyoto lacked the authority to back up its intent. But it did set the precedent for international action on climate change, and while it quickly lost momentum and credibility its long term legacy may be that world leaders learn from their mistakes.

That is the context in which the Copenhagen Conference is set. As world leaders arrive, it is still very much in the balance whether a global deal will be reached.

I hope to bring you the latest news from behind the scenes over the next couple of days on The Steamie. You can also follow me on Twitter - just follow @georgelyonmep