Do you believe that the United States should commit to the Paris Agreement? What arguments most influenced your decision? Do you believe that we will experience significant global warming during this

Assignment

Do you believe that the United States should commit to the Paris Agreement? What arguments most influenced your decision?

Do you believe that we will experience significant global warming during this century due to air pollution? In what way would the Paris Agreement impact your position on global warming?

What is the effect of global warming on the Earth's water resources?

Your paper should be 2-3 pages in length and all citations must use APA formatting with 4 resources. Please refer to the Course Project overview for a list of all requirements for this paper.

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Module 04 Course Project - Air and Water

Lesson Content

Kyoto Protocol and Paris Agreement

In November of 1998, during the Clinton administration, the United States signed the Kyoto Protocol. However, the Protocol was never submitted to the Senate for ratification. In 2001 the Bush Administration outright rejected the Kyoto Protocol. In 2011 Canada withdrew for the Kyoto Protocol and Japan and Russia state they would not take on any further Kyoto targets. Without the backing of such major nations, the Kyoto Protocol, which does remain in effect, seemingly lost much of it significance.

In December 2012, 195 countries adopted by consensus the Paris Agreement. As of September 2016, 179 nations and the European Union have signed the treaty, of which 27 have ratified it. One of these nations is the United States, which signed the agreement on September 3, 2016.

One of the most important debates about the Paris Agreement is how much it resembles the Kyoto Protocol that the U.S. did not ratify and that failed to have much of an impact on global emissions. Opponents of the Paris deal say it's basically the same as Kyoto, an ambitious agreement that countries won't follow through on.

Supporters say it's the opposite. The Paris deal loops in more countries than the Kyoto Protocol and gives them more flexibility to meet goals. China is on board, however unambitiously, with the Paris agreement. Climate advocates say that's a major improvement from the Kyoto Protocol. The Paris agreement's broad nature is claimed to signal a new era of climate cooperation. The Paris negotiations attracted cooperation from China and other developing countries through another significant difference between it and the Kyoto Protocol — the Paris agreement's terms aren't legally binding. Instead, they are guidelines that call on countries to pass their own laws. The Paris accords also put more emphasis on the Green Climate Fund, which sends money from wealthier countries to ones that are still developing. The U.S. and other wealthy countries got developing nations to sign on to the Paris deal partly because they promised financial support.

Despite the Paris agreement's differences with the Kyoto Protocol, comparisons to the unsuccessful Kyoto agreement are tempting for opponents. The agreement is already gaining opponents in the U.S. Senate. These opponents criticize how low the bar is set for China, which is required to "peak" its emissions by 2030 rather than achieving any actual reductions. The disparity between China and other country's commitments illustrates that the Paris deal "is mainly political theater — like most aspects of this deal — to forward the interests of those most involved in orchestrating the agreement.".

Advocates for the Paris agreement see it differently. They point to its treatment of China as an improvement on Kyoto's shortcomings. China's Paris goals might not be ambitious, but under the Kyoto Protocol, China and other developing countries didn't set any greenhouse gas targets.

(Please see the additional Attachments for Articles)

For more information, please review the following articles:

Kyoto Protocol. (2016). In Encyclopaedia Britannica. Link to article.

Driscoll, S., & Flynn. (2016). Global Warming: An Overview. Points Of View: Global Warming, 1. Link to article.

Shorr, D. (2014). Think Again: Climate Treaties. Foreign Policy, (205), 1. Link to article.

Kienast, A. N. (2015). Consensus Behind Action: The Fate of the Paris Agreement in the United States of America. Carbon & Climate Law Review, 9(4), 314-327. The "Paris Gap," and How to Fix It. (2016). Environmental Forum, 33(2), 22. Link to article