A carbon timer

Starting this week, a 70-foot sign with a 13-character red digital display in New York’s busy lane alongside Madison Square garden and Penn Station, is tracking the trillions of tons of greenhouse gases roiling the atmosphere. The work of scientists from around the country, it takes into account all greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide, and reports them in carbon dioxide equivalents. It skips the effects of natural cycles.

The technical challenge of creating a real-time counter using economic indicators and other data, which are validated and adjusted as updated gas measurements become available, is no small task.Jeffrey Sachs inaugurated the counter alongwith an expert from MIT. The switch was flipped, and the 13-digit number appeared. The last three digits were a red blur.

Consider that conventional wisdom on climate change says that for average rise in temperatures not to go beyond two degrees Celsius, we need to keep rising concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere below 400 parts per million (ppm). The count was 390 ppm as on May 2009!

We have very less time to make amends! Every new study seems to reduce the time available.

Just contrast the change in stance of UN's top climate change official Yvo de Boer from June 1 to June 11! From a "There is no doubt in my mind that the Copenhagen climate conference in December is going to lead to a result" he switched to, it would be "physically impossible" to have a detailed deal to tackle climate change by the December climate change conference in the Danish capital Copenhagen.

"Delivery on four political essentials" on which the success in Copenhagen would depend, was turning out to be "impossible", he said. The four essentials, are: clarity on how much industrialised countries would reduce their emissions up to 2020; clarity on what developing countries would do to limit the growth of their emissions; stable finance from industrialised nations for the developing world to mitigate climate change and adapt; and a "governance regime".

Developing nations like India are harping on historical responsibility while industrialized nations are offering token reductions, of between 17-26 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, which just aren’t enough. The 27-nation European Union has offered a cut of 20 percent by 2020 relative to its emissions in 1990. The U.S. has proposed a 17 percent reduction compared to its 2005 emissions, which would amount to about 4 percent by comparison to 1990.

Meanwhile, in attempts to protect national growth concerns, various countries have together added some 200 pages to the 21-page proposal for amendments to the Kyoto Protocol!

Can the common man walking the road and watching the numbers racing on the carbon counter make a difference?