Nicole Prévost Logan

At 7.26 p.m. precisely on Saturday, Dec. 12, Laurent Fabius, president of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) COP 21 , choking with emotion, announced that an universal accord had been reached. The several thousand people in the audience rose in a standing ovation and started congratulating each other.

After two sleepless nights, the “facilitators” wrenched out an agreement by consensus from the 195 Convention’s members. The suspense lasted until the absolute final minute when Nicaragua tried to interrupt. It was too late — the president had already snapped down his gavel. The conference could very well have been a failure – it had to overcome a block from the oil-producing countries such as Saudi Arabia – but on that last day, there were no grim faces, as had been seen in Copenhagen, only a general enthusiasm.

Credit should be given to the involvement of the French organizers. For two years they traveled several times around the world to meet every leader. President François Hollande was talking to president Xi Jinping just one month before the start of the Convention. All paid homage to the professionalism of Fabius who seemed on a mission throughout the process. “You did an amazing job,” commented John Kerry, while Al Gore added, “This is the finest diplomatic performance I have seen in two decades.”

In a nutshell, the agreement reads as follows:

• its main objective is to limit the increase in temperature to “well below” two degrees by the end of this century
• developed countries should reduce their emissions of greenhouse gas and the developing countries should “mitigate” them
• Article 9 stipulates that “developed country parties shall provide financial resources to assist developing countries”
• the agreement, which will be ratified in April 2016, requires an annual payment of 100 billion Euros, with a revision every five years

President Barrack Obama is expected to use an Executive Order to avoid the likely opposition of the Republican majority in the Congress; in the absence of coercion and sanctions — a mechanism of control by satellite (France is financing the “MicroCarb” satellite) — provides an attempt at transparency and ongoing verification by a committee of experts thus making the agreement de facto binding.

Never before has there been such an awareness of the threat caused by global warming. The vagaries of the climate and the fact that 2015 is the warmest year in recorded history contributed to this sense of urgency. Today any debate about climate skepticism has become obsolete.

What makes the Paris conference different from all the ones before is a groundswell of positive intentions. For the first time the main polluters of the planet – China, the US and India – are on board and are determined to make the agreement work. Already 187 out of the 195 countries have announced their voluntary contributions.

Today the action of society as a whole is crucial. It is important to note that, at the Bourget, the Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), private associations and a number of organizations were working just a few steps from the UN “Blue Zone” for government officials (at the Lima, Peru, COP, they had been “exiled” 15 kilometers away). Giant screens in the hallways made it possible for the general public to follow the proceedings, breaking away from the closed door policy of the past.

After the initial euphoria felt on Dec. 12, a number of questions remains unanswered, some of the objectives are unclear – no date was set as to when to reach the greenhouse gas neutrality nor when to end the use of fossil energy, no price was put on carbon – and the unfairness of many decisions has become apparent – such as the financing and the sharing of responsibilities between the “North” or rich countries and the developing countries — or to put it another way, who pays whom and for what? Until now Europe, and France in particular, have been paying a great deal. A country such as Russia has not paid one cent so far. Are China and India – the big polluters of the planet – still considered as part of the developing world and expected to be on the receiving end of hundreds of billions of Euros?

Nicolas Hulot, militant environmentalist and an icon in France, deemed the agreement very positive even though it was not perfect. “Such a movement of solidarity around the planet has never been seen before,” he stated, adding, “There is a momentum, which needs to be seized and followed by action.”