Next month's United Nations climate change conference is doomed to failure. The pre-emptive recriminations are already under way weeks before any delegates are due to arrive in Copenhagen. The finger of blame is being pointed firmly at Washington. It hardly seems worth the carbon to fly in all those officials, environmentalists, scientists and lobbyists, not to say presidents and prime ministers.
A word or two of definition is needed. When the UN negotiators met in Bali in December 2007, they set a two-year deadline for an agreement to replace the Kyoto protocol. The remit called for a new accord to cut global carbon emissions at once tougher and more inclusive than its predecessor.
There are three essential elements to such a bargain: deep cuts in the CO2 emissions of rich countries alongside curbs on the carbon-intensity of growth in rising economies; a financial transfer arrangement to mitigate the cost to poorer nations of a shift to a low-carbon economy; and a commitment to embed national targets in a binding international treaty.