Hearing of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations' Subcommittee on Near East and Asia- International Climate Change Negotiations Panel I
Interview
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SEN. LISA MURKOWSKI (R-AK): Thank you, Madame Secretary, for your appearance here this afternoon. We've had a fair amount of discussion about the mitigation aspect, a little bit about the technology. Certainly Senator Hagel has been involved in that initiative through -- (inaudible).
But I want to ask a couple questions about the adaptation component that you have addressed, and you mentioned specifically the forestry adaptation. Certainly in my state, climate change is happening. We are seeing it, whether it is change in vegetation as it advances northward, whether it is the change in our fisheries. We're seeing different species of fish further north.
Certainly you see all of the articles about the thinning of the ice and the receding of the ice pack and the consequences, the impact not only to the land, to the animals, to the water fowl that is out there, but the people that rely on them. So for us, adaptation is very, very key. It's not some theoretical exercise.
Senator Menendez mentioned that in his state of New Jersey with the coastline, potentially his constituents could be impacted. Well, my constituents are being impacted. I've got communities that are literally being washed out to sea as we speak. And yet we're trying to advance legislation here within the Congress that addresses things from the domestic perspective, and we really are not focused on the adaptation component.
So I'm pleased to see that there is a -- I guess, a greater focus as we move forward.
I'm curious, though, how much has the discussion really centered on adaptation and how will we be able to provide for this financially? Take just one coastal village. We're looking at 120 (million dollars) to $140 million to move a little village. This is one small village in Alaska. What is the proposal as we move forward? I notice in the framework for a post-2012 agreement on climate change, there's reference to -- in the adaptation section -- a substantial package of financial support, including public and private funds should be established. Certainly necessary.
We're also going to need considerable capital as we develop the technologies, not only for this country but the technologies that we will be required to help other countries with, perhaps the less- developed nations. We've -- they're going to be looking to us for that assistance. To what extent, whether it's the adaptation or the technology -- to what extent does the financing piece of this come into play, and what are the proposals out there for how we realistically can deal with these very, very difficult situations?
MS. DOBRIANSKY: Senator, thank you.
I'd make several points. First, as I indicated, it is very significant that adaptation is put into the framework and, I would say, at the same level of mitigation. Far too often, we have looked at mitigation and mitigation alone. And what has been striking in terms of the movement in the discourse in the recent meetings leading up to Bali is agreement that there is a need to address adaptation. So first, just in terms of where countries basically are.
Secondly, in terms of the issue of funding, we have put in ourselves a significant amount of resources looking at practical approaches, starting with a basic issue of being able to determine and help those developing countries forecast and deal with a climactic change. And how do you prepare for that? That's through -- I mentioned the Global Earth Observation System of Systems, of which you have some 70 countries, and even over that, developing countries in particular. We've put monies into that to try to help them in building capacity. That's not enough. In addition --
SEN. MURKOWSKI: Who else is helping us with that financing -- (inaudible)?
MS. DOBRIANSKY: I can provide you the list. It's a significant --
SEN. MURKOWSKI: Well, I know that with the --
MS. DOBRIANSKY: -- (inaudible) -- both developed and developing, a wide range --
SEN. MURKOWSKI: -- with the Asia-Pacific partnership, the United States had kicked in their share but there was some issue as to whether or not every -- the other participants had made equal financial contribution.
MS. DOBRIANSKY: There have been different contributions put in. There's a meeting coming up of the Global Earth Observation System of Systems in South Africa in two weeks' time. But other countries have come forward and have put in resources on that.
MR. REIFSNYDER: The European Commission in particular has been very supportive of this effort and has put a lot of money into the GEO, the Group on Earth Observations, I should say.
MS. DOBRIANSKY: But thirdly, that's not enough. Here what is also critical is looking for those most effective development strategies. We have worked very closely with our U.S. Agency for International Development in looking at how we deal not only with issues of climate change but how we also deal with development approaches to those countries in tandem and in a way that's sustainable.
One of the most, I would say, graphic examples is dealing with forestry, because you -- mostly forestry has been looked at in a mitigation context, but by the way, there's also the issue you hear from small island states: How can you help us in terms of our livelihood and ensuring that we can use forests as part of our livelihood and at the same time also preserve our forests? How do you balance the two?
We look at this through a broader prism of development strategies, in which we've put in significant resources.
I'd like to mention you went to, in fact, which -- I know you have an interest, Senator -- my colleague was in Norway -- and in which they were discussing particularly adaptation measures in the Arctic and looking --
SEN. MURKOWSKI: Is that going to be part of the Arctic policy that we advance, then?
MR. REIFSNYDER: Yes. This meeting in Oslo last week was really concerned about not only carbon dioxide emissions as a factor in terms of warming in the Arctic but also on emissions of other gases, in particular methane, volatile organic compounds, and black soot was another key focus.
I know that they're concerned about melting of the Greenland ice sheet, about the melting of sea ice, and about release of methane from Arctic tundra. This was a very interesting opportunity, Senator, because we had countries there -- in particular, Sweden and Norway -- that knew very little, I found at the meeting, about our Methane to Markets Partnership. And I detected a great deal of interest in that, in trying -- in terms of addressing methane emissions as a way of trying to slow warming in the Arctic in particular. So it was a very positive outcome from the session.
Could I mention, if I could, one other aspect? And I've been -- I was the person that was in Montreal in September that negotiated on behalf of the United States the accelerated phase-out of HCFCs under the Montreal Protocol, which has an enormous impact.
Twenty-five percent of Kyoto is what we anticipate is the CO2 equivalent, three gigatons. And it's been kind of disappointing to me too that people have not really focused on the fact that this was a major step forward on the climate front. It has the potential if we can find substances that have no global warming potential or a much lower global warming potential to be even bigger than the impact of Kyoto.
So I think it's important to keep in mind -- I understand the Montreal Protocol is not focus of our climate efforts, but the links between actions under Montreal Protocol and the climate that have a great impact on emissions of greenhouse gases.
SEN. MURKOWSKI: Thank you.
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