1 Paris climate change agreement: the world's greatest diplomatic success, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/13/paris-climate-deal-cop-diplomacy-developing-united-nations

2 The Paris Climate Change Agreement is an Epic Failure, http://www.flassbeck-economics.de/the-paris-climate-change-agreement-is-an-epic-failure/

3 Paris climate deal: reaction from the experts, Dec 12, 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/13/paris-climate-deal-reaction-experts?CMP=share_btn_link

4 COP21: Paris deal far too weak to prevent devastating climate change, academics warn, The Independent, 8 January 2015, http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/cop21-paris-deal-far-too-weak-to-prevent-devastating-climate-change-academics-warn-a6803096.html

5 Stewart, Richard, Kingsbury, Benedict & Rudyk, Bruce (Eds.), Climate Finance Regulatory and Funding Strategies for Climate Change and Global Development, NYU Press, 2009 Google Scholar.

6 B. Lomborg, Impact of Current Climate Proposals, Global Policy, 2015, DOI: 10.1111/1758-5899.12295 (showing that the total temperature reduction of all INDCs will be 0.048°C by 2100). For Lomborg's response to critiques, see the links available at http://www.lomborg.com/press-release-research-reveals-negligible-impact-of-paris-climate-promises Cf. J. Reilly et al., Energy and Climate Outlook, Perspectives from 2015, MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change (showing that proposed cuts extended through 2100 result in about 0.2°C less warming by the end of the century compared with 2014 estimates).

7 J. Reilly et al., Energy and Climate Outlook, Perspectives from 2015, MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change (showing that proposed cuts extended through 2100 result in about 0.2°C less warming by the end of the century compared with 2014 estimates).

8 The Copenhagen Consensus on Climate project has found that every euro spent on green R&D avoids 100 times more climate change than money spent on inefficient wind and solar. Copenhagen Consensus Center, http://www.copenhagenconsensus.com

9 L. Bergkamp & S. Stone, The Trojan Horse of the Paris Climate Agreement: How Multi-Level, Non-Hierarchical Governance Poses A Threat to Constitutional Government, [2015] Environmental Liability 4, pp. 119-140. Cf. Samantha Page, No, The Paris Climate Agreement Isn't Binding. Here's Why That Doesn't Matter, Dec 14, 2015, http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/12/14/3731715/paris-agreement-is-an-actual-agreement (If a country is missing its [submitted] targets, “domestic constituencies will be mobilizing to force government action (…) That's going to be the primary mover of emissions reductions worldwide.”) UN Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon called the climate movement “a huge trend” and said “[n]obody can go against this wave.” Cited in: Natasha Geiling, How Paris Turned The Climate Movement Into An Everyone Movement, Dec. 14, 2015, http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/12/14/3731402/paris-climate-agreement-movement-is-power/ Lewis argues that “both conservative gloating and green grousing about the treaty being ‘toothless’ overlook what matters most in climate policy: politics.” Marlo Lewis, Paris Agreement: Recycled “Process” Socialism, January 3, 2016, http://www.globalwarming.org/2016/01/03/paris-agreement-recycled-process-socialism/

10 What the Paris Climate Agreement Means for Business: A Conversation with BSR's Edward Cameron, http://www.bsr.org/en/our-insights/blog-view/what-paris-climate-agreement-means-for-business-conversation-edward-cameron

11 L. Bergkamp, The concept of risk society as a model for risk regulation – its hidden and not so hidden ambitions, side effects, and risks (forthcoming, 2016).

12 L. Bergkamp, “Adjudicating scientific disputes in climate science: the limits of judicial competence and the risks of taking sides”, 3 Environmental Liability, 80-102 (2015). As the headline of an article in Politico put it, “[n]ext stop for Paris climate deal: the courts. First came the agreement. Now comes the litigation.” Sara Stefanini, Next stop for Paris climate deal: the courts, Politico, 1/13/16, http://www.politico.eu/article/paris-climate-urgenda-courts-lawsuits-cop21/

13 Climate activists willing to suspend or set aside democracy include Shearman and Smith, who have argued that in order to halt or even slow the disastrous process of climate change, we must choose between liberal democracy and a form of authoritarian government by experts. Likewise, in The Vanishing Face of Gaia: A Final Warning, Lovelock observes that survival may require the suspension of democratic government. James Lovelock, The Vanishing Face of Gaia: A Final Warning, Penguin, 2010.

14 According to Thomas Pogge, a top academic philosopher who is a driving force behind the Oslo Principles on Global Climate Change Obligations, in order to realize “a peaceful and ecologically sound future” the world needs “supranational institutions and organizations that limit the sovereignty rights of states more severely than is the current practice.” Pogge, Thomas W., World Poverty and Human Rights, 2nd Edition, Oxford: Polity Press, 2008, pp. 219–220 Google Scholar. Pogge, Thomas W., Kant's Vision of a Just World Order, in: Hill, T.E. (ed.), The Blackwell Guide to Kant's Ethics, Blackwell, 2009, pp. 196–208, at 205-206Google Scholar. See also Oslo Principles on Global Climate Change Obligations, http://globaljustice.macmillan.yale.edu/news/oslo-principles-global-climate-change-obligations.

15 Biggest Emitter China Best on Climate, Figueres Says, January 14, 2014, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-01-13/top-global-emitter-china-best-on-climate-change-figueres-says

16 U.N. Official Reveals Real Reason Behind Warming Scare, http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/021015-738779-climate-change-scare-tool-to-destroy-capitalism.htm Cf. the proposed creation of a “movement of movements.” Martin Lukacs, Claim no easy victories. Paris was a failure, but a climate justice movement is rising, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/true-north/2015/dec/15/claim-no-easy-victories-paris-was-a-failure-but-a-climate-justice-movement-is-rising

17 The UNFCCC's executive secretary has declared openly that climate policy pursues the more general goal of changing “the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years.” U.N. Official Reveals Real Reason Behind Warming Scare, http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/021015-738779-climate-change-scare-tool-to-destroy-capitalism.htm

18 Lukasc notes that the “economic system's drive for endless profits and extraction wasn't up for debate in Paris, but it may be soon.” Martin Lukacs, Claim no easy victories. Paris was a failure, but a climate justice movement is rising, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/true-north/2015/dec/15/claim-no-easy-victories-paris-was-a-failure-but-a-climate-justice-movement-is-rising Delingpole has claimed that climate change is an ideological battle, not a scientific one, and that the environmental movement wants to rule, not save, the world. James Delingpole, Watermelons: The Green Movement's True Colors, New York: Publius Books, 2011.

19 UNFCC boss: democracy is “very detrimental” for war on AGW, January 14, 2014, http://motls.blogspot.com/2014/01/unfcc-boss-democracy-is-very.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

20 Council conclusions on European climate diplomacy after COP-21, 15 February 2016, http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2016/02/15-fac-climate-diplomacy/

21 L. Bergkamp, The EU's ineffective climate diplomacy post-Paris,, 22 February 2016, http://www.euractiv.com/section/climate-environment/opinion/the-eus-ineffective-climate-diplomacy-post-paris/. To reduce the democratic deficit, the national parliaments of the member states should be given an opportunity to have a meaningful debate on the Paris Agreement, and approve the burdens it requires of them. L. Bergkamp, National Parliaments should approve Paris Climate Agreement before it is a done deal, EnergyPost, 8 March 2016, http://www.energypost.eu/national-parliaments-approve-paris-climate-agreement-done-deal/.

22 See, e.g., D. Wirth, The International and Domestic Law of Climate Change: A Binding International Agreement Without the Senate or Congress?, Harvard Environmental Law Review, Vol. 39, No. 2, 2015.

23 The uncertainty and vagueness inherent in the Paris Agreement present issues of democratic control; how should a government decide whether it will join, if it cannot tell what its obligations will be?

24 Harro van Asselt & Stefan Bößner, Reviewing Implementation under the Paris Agreement, Carisma, February 1, 2016, http://www.sei-international.org/publications?pid=2896

25 Note that the Paris Agreement does not establish a procedure for deciding whether any impact is related to climate change.

26 Article 8, Paris Agreement.

27 Sarewitz has noted that “[c]limate science served one main purpose: to advance [a top-down, coordinated, international emissions governance] regime.” D. Sarewitz, Does climate change knowledge really matter?, WIRES Climate Change, 2011.

28 G. Stigler, The theory of economic regulation, Bell J. Econ. Man. Sci. 1971, 2, pp. 3-21.

29 The European Commission, however, has insisted on maintaining the risk assessment- risk management distinction in EU policymaking. European Commission, Communication on the Precautionary Principle, Brussels, 2.2.2000, COM(2000) 1 final.

30 President Obama has opined that the climate debate is settled, and refers to critics as “the flat earth society.” Obama: No time for a meeting of the Flat Earth Society, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-23057369

31 Projections differ from predictions in that “the future will ultimately be determined by actions taken to stabilize our relationship with the planet,” leading to the informal fallacy of circular reasoning. http://globalchange.mit.edu/research/publications/other/special/2015Outlook.

33 J. Cook et al, Quantifying the consensus on anthropogenic global warming in the scientific literature, Environ. Res. Lett. 8, 024024, http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/8/2/024024; http://jsessionid=24BB298175E37DFEA88641E3E90A59F6.c1 For an older study producing the same result, see William R. L. Anderegg et al., Expert credibility in climate change, PNAS, 2010, vol. 107, no. 27, pp. 12107–12109. Cf. Peter T. Doran & Maggie Kendall Zimmerman, Examining the Scientific Consensus on Climate Change, EOS, Vol. 90, No. 3, 20 Jan. 2009, pp. 22-23.

34 R. S.J. Tol, Quantifying the consensus on anthropogenic global warming in the literature: A re-analysis, Energy Policy, Volume 73, October 2014, pages 701–705. See also his op-ed in The Guardian, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/blog/2014/jun/06/97-consensus-global-warming

35 Bergkamp, L., “Adjudicating scientific disputes in climate science: the limits of judicial competence and the risks of taking sides”, 3 Environmental Liability, 80–102 (2015)Google Scholar.

36 Activists have attempted to discredit pertinent counter-arguments merely by reference to slogans such as “merchants of doubt” and “the fossil fuel lobby.” Cf. Naomi Oreskes, Erik M. Conway, Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming, Bloomsbury Press, 2010. This book argues that “merchants of doubt” claim that there is no “scientific consensus” on an issue, although there is one. See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fossil_fuels_lobby

37 “Best Available Science” Defined in Proposed Endangered Species Act Legislation, http://www.martenlaw.com/newsletter/20051221-best-avail-science See also J. Curry, So what is the best available scientific evidence, anyways?, 14 Aug 2013, https://judithcurry.com/2013/08/14/so-what-is-the-best-available-scientific-evidence-anyways/

38 Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, Sound Science, Technical Issue Paper, 1999. It has also been defined in simple terms as “robustly supported science, confirmed by multiple peer-reviewed studies.” http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Sound_science

39 For a discussion of some of these terms, see L. Bergkamp & L. Kogan, Trade, the Precautionary Principle, and Post-Modern Regulatory Process: Regulatory Convergence in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, European Journal of Risk Regulation, 2013/4, pp. 493-507.

40 The 2-degree target was already included a decision made at COP-16 in 2010; this decision also entertains the idea of a “global average temperature rise of 1.5 °C.” See Report of the Conference of the Parties on its sixteenth session, held in Cancun from 29 November to 10 December 2010, FCCC/CP/2010/7/Add.1, Decision 1/CP.16 Decision 1/CP.16: The Cancun Agreements: Outcome of the work of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Longterm Cooperative Action under the Convention, 15 March 2011.

41 L. Bergkamp & S. Stone, The Trojan Horse of the Paris Climate Agreement: How Multi-Level, Non-Hierarchical Governance Poses A Threat to Constitutional Government, [2015] Environmental Liability 4, pp. 119-140. A big problem with Paris’ collective objective may be that the savvy politicians of individual nations adopt a “progressive” stance if it does not bite, but a “conservative” one where acts require sacrifice. Cf. Oliver Geden, Paris climate deal: the trouble with targetism, The Guardian, 14 December 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/science/political-science/2015/dec/14/the-trouble-with-targetism

42 U. Beck, Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity, London: Sage, 1992. U. Beck, World Risk Society. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1999. U. Beck, World at Risk, Cambridge: Polity Press, 2009.

43 L. Bergkamp, The concept of risk society as a model for risk regulation – its hidden and not so hidden ambitions, side effects, and risks (forthcoming, 2016).

44 See, for instance, Oslo Principles on Global Climate Change Obligations, http://globaljustice.macmillan.yale.edu/news/oslo-principles-global-climate-change-obligations and the critique set out in L. Bergkamp & S. Stone, The Trojan Horse of the Paris Climate Agreement: How Multi-Level, Non-Hierarchical Governance Poses A Threat to Constitutional Government, [2015] Environmental Liability 4, pp. 119-140.

45 COP-21 Decision, under 54.