Why Should Russia Reconsider?
There are many reasons, both domestic and international, why Russia should reevaluate its climate policy. In order to live up to its aspiration as a leading and contributing player on key international issues, as envisaged by the leadership in Moscow, Russia cannot afford to be seen as ignoring the common task of tackling climate change—a key issue on the international policy agenda. The current starting point of claiming that Russia has already overwhelmingly contributed to the objective of meeting global climate targets is simply no longer credible in the eyes of the G8 and G20. This is further underlined by the agreement made at the 2011 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Durban to negotiate a new global climate pact by 2015. That pact will have to contain more ambitious emission reduction commitments for all countries if it is to work.
Russia also has compelling reasons to take the threat of climate change seriously. Temperatures in Russia are rising relatively quickly with some potentially negative consequences. This is hardly surprising as temperatures in the Arctic, where a large part of Russian territories lie, have been rising faster than in the rest of the world. This underlines the risk Russia runs if it continues to treat climate change as somebody else’s problem—or even worse, a Western conspiracy to force Russia to buy foreign green technologies. Other industrialized countries, for instance those in the European Union, are acting on climate because they recognize the economic and human risks involved.