KECK INSTITUTE FOR SPACE STUDIES

       


Abstract:

The United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen (2009) tackled the challenge of designing and implementing a global agreement for control of greenhouse gas emissions. At the meeting, the issue of compliance was raised: If treaties to control carbon emissions are adopted, how would we know if nations were living up to their agreements?

Given the large global emissions of fossil fuel, why is it such a challenge to know how much each country is emitting?