T

he countries at the 17th Conference of the Parties (COP17) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Durban, South Africa, have finally struck a deal.

After the conference started at a snail’s pace on Nov. 28, there were fears that talks would collapse, sounding the death knell for the only climate treaty in place, the Kyoto Protocol, after its first carbon-cuts commitment period ended next year.

Only in overtime did the conference pick up steam, continuing straight into a second extra day on early Sunday — making Durban the longest UN climate talks in two decades.

Delegates from 194 countries agreed to hang on to the struggling Kyoto Protocol a little bit longer, as the treaty enters its second commitment period from 2013-2017.

Delegates also agreed on the design of a Green Climate Fund to help poor countries cope with the impact of
climate change and required all countries to sign a binding deal in 2015 that would force them to cut emissions no later than 2020.

Loopholes, however, abound.

Under the terms of the deal — called the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action — nations agreed to form a working group to “develop a new protocol, another legal instrument or agreed outcome with legal force that will be applicable to all parties to the UN climate convention”.

With this, the negotiators may have made unprecedented — albeit small — progress in persuading major emitters such as China and India, who were not required to make carbon cuts under the Kyoto, and the US, which has not ratified the protocol, to jump on the bandwagon.

The devil is in the details. The nature of the “legal instrument” or “agreed outcome” has been left undecided, raising speculation it was made to save face for the host country or was simply a watered-down product to ensure consensus.

It is also unclear how governments plan to deal with emission cuts after the end of the Kyoto’s second commitment period before a new treaty takes effect.

Although the conference made progress on the design of Green Climate Fund, which is set to channel up to US$100 billion a year to poor countries by 2020, it is still unclear where the money will come from.

After long debate, the Durban talks failed to push harder for a real deal — no deeper emission cut pledges were made other than those already made in Copenhagen back in 2009 and last year in Cancun.

UN reports released last month warned that delays on a global agreement to cut emissions will make it harder to keep the average temperature rise to within 2 degrees Celsius over the next century. Meanwhile, a warming planet already has intensified droughts and floods and increased crop failures and sea levels.

By delaying real action until 2020, another chance to really deal with climate change will slip away.

There’s no reason to celebrate.