G8 Research Group

The Deauville Declaration noted that the 17^th Conference of the Parties (COP) in Durban will be used by the G8 members as an opportunity to strive for a “comprehensive, ambitious, fair, effective and binding agreement involving all countries, and including the respective responsibilities of all major economies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”  In addition, the G8 members stated that all major economies are responsible for significantly decreasing their emissions below business as usual levels.  While all major economies were urged to decrease their emissions the declaration did not specify a deadline for these reductions.

The G8 did not explicitly state whether or not the Kyoto Protocol should be extended beyond 2012 and there is no evidence that the G8 members specifically discussed terminating the Kyoto Protocol during the summit. Thus, Japan has received a score of 0.5 because the Deauville Declaration states that all major economies should undertake binding emission targets.[1]