Maldives may soon be under water

World leaders and save-the-world-from-scotching-and-drowning buffs begin deliberations today in Copenhagen. One of them, Maldives President Mohamed Nasheed, deserves special mention.

The summit ends on Friday next week. It aims at an international pact on what nations must do to curb global warming.

Whichever way the pact reads, it will replace the Tokyo Protocol of 1997, expiring in two years. The protocol came into force in 2005. A hundred and eighty-four parties of the convention have ratified it.

The protocol places heavier burden on industrialised countries. It sets targets for reducing in five years emissions of greenhouse gases, now accepted as the cause of global warming.

Dangerous

The warming is already leading to potentially dangerous occurrences, including melting of glaciers and ice caps, expansion and rising level of oceans, and drying of landmasses. Possible catastrophes are limitless. Nonetheless, Copenhagen will have joined cities honoured to host save-our-planet orchestras.

Barely a year in office, Mr Nasheed is a late comer in these orchestras. However, he’s blowing the tuba with gusto. It’s understandable.

Situated across the Equator southwest of Sri Lanka, the 1,190 coral islands form an archipelago of 26 natural atolls. Of the 298 square-kilometre territory, only 0.331 per cent is land, inhabited by 400,000 people. By all accounts, the country’s ecology is varied and exotic. Tourism is lucrative.

The catch is that the average natural land height is 2.1 metres with the highest point 2.3 metres. Moreover, current estimates place sea rise at 59 centimetres by the year 2100. Was that to happen, a huge chunk of the Republic of Maldives will vanish. Specifically, at 70 centimetres rise in 40 years, 30 per cent of the country would submerge. Mr Nasheed would be 81. Of course, land would submerge in the 42 nations that form the Alliance of Small Ocean States, of which Maldives is a member. Often overlooked, the same would happen to many places around the globe. Many cities in the world are located on shorelines and some, like Rotterdam, below sea level.

The difference is availability of options. Countries with plenty of money—and that’s where most large cities are—have options of constructing sea walls or moving people into hinterland. For some poor nations, the latter is an option; the former would depend on largesse from rich nations.

Scientists say limiting global warming at two degrees Celsius rise over pre-industrial levels at least up to 2050 would provide a fair chance of avoiding a dangerous change. That would mean no more than an estimated 1,300 billions tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

A Reuters report last week had accounting firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers saying at the current emissions the carbon dioxide safe limit would occur 16 earlier. In other worlds, the world is emitting more carbon dioxide than it should.

As in the past, nations and groupings will haggle as to who should do what. Poor nations will press the rich to cut emissions. Additionally poor nations will seek compensation for damages done and help to deal with emerging ones. Rich nations will point fingers at each other and promise the poor “as much as we can.” It’s all about who will do what first.

Mr Nasheed would definitely welcome money from rich nations. He has additional ideas though. He’s seeking to buy land and settle Maldivians in the event land submerges. He also plans to make his country carbon neutral in ten years, globally little.

([email protected])