Global climate change poses serious threats to the people and nations of the world, and the long-term, global nature of the problem has important implications for the design and implementation of effective policy, in particular for the design of a global climate policy architecture that is scientifically sound, economically rational, and politically pragmatic. The costs of abating greenhouse gas emissions occur locally and in the present, but the benefits accrue globally and over multiple generations.

The most important greenhouse gas that policy can affect, carbon dioxide, is a byproduct of the combustion of fossil fuels that serve as the primary source of energy for industrialized, emerging, and developing economies around the world. Relatively wealthy, developed countries are responsible for a majority of the anthropogenic greenhouse gases that have already accumulated in the atmosphere, but poor, developing countries will emit more greenhouse gases over this century than those currently industrialized nations if no efforts are taken to change their course of development. The problem of climate change with its global, long-term environmental, economic, energy, and development consequences necessitates the design of a sound international climate change policy architecture.

The Kyoto Protocol frequently has been described as a “first step” to address this awesome long-term, global problem. It is the first agreement to have imposed binding legal commitments on greenhouse gas emissions. In addition to representing the first step to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, the Protocol represents the first step in the ultimate design of an effective, long-term international climate change policy architecture.