International climate negotiations have always been a magnet for corporate groups eager to shape the process in their interests, and the December COP in Copenhagen, which aims to agree a new global climate policy for post 2012, is a prime target.

Traditionally business has influenced the UN climate negotiations through the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), representing thousands of companies, and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), which brings together chief executives from some 200 companies, including energy giants Shell, BP and E.ON. The WBCSD has pioneered the image of business as a solution in the environmental crisis. Together the ICC and the WBCSD regularly give input on climate issues at the international level.

The ICC and WBCSD also organise Business Days at the COP meetings, bringing together business people and high-level negotiators. The Copenhagen Business Day, welcomed by the UN climate elite, is on December 11th. Yvo de Boer has said there would be “many opportunities for a useful dialogue with business” over the coming year and that business was “key to a low-carbon future”.

Another major corporate player lobbying the UN climate negotiations is IETA, the International Emission Trading Association. With over 150 member corporations, IETA has a strong presence at climate negotiations, bringing the largest delegation of lobbyists to the last two COPs. In Bali and Poznan IETA brought over 300 and 250 representatives respectively. IETA’s focus is to push for wider carbon markets. The run up to COP15 has attracted more players, invited on board by the Danish Government (See the Corporate Europe Observatory briefing, Climate Summit Inc.). In May, the World Business Summit on Climate Change took place in Copenhagen, part of the Danish Government’s strategy to secure business support for an agreement in December. Co-organised by the Copenhagen Climate Council, Tony Blair’s ‘Climate Group’; Vattenfall’s ‘Combat Climate Change’ (3C); the WBCSD; the UN Global Compact and the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Climate Change Initiative. The Summit was endorsed by the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon.

The Danish Government wanted a strong statement from the event, promising business a central role in the negotiations. In exchange they hope that business can help convince the more reluctant governments, including the US, China, India and Mexico, to sign up to a deal.

Business did its duty and produced the “Copenhagen Call”, described by the Danish Prime Minister as “sweet music in my ears”. Although calling for more ambitious targets than might be expected from business, the devil is in the detail. The Copenhagen Call echoes the demands of its conveners (and others such as the ICC and IETA): a global carbon market, support for corporate-friendly technologies, in particular carbon capture and storage (CCS) and nuclear.

Business wants public money to fund the risk of developing and deploying controversial technologies. CCS is not yet available and will not make a difference in the next 10 years - when action needs to be taken. Nuclear energy relies on the world’s diminishing supplies of uranium, produces radioactive waste and is not a clean source of energy. The less prominent calls for renewable energy included demands for agrofuels, which entail serious social and environmental impacts. These are pseudo solutions which do not offer an effective response to the climate crisis. They delay real action and divert public money from solutions that work.

These same demands have been repeated at national level, with individual companies lobbying national governments as part of the international groups, or in national or regional corporate lobby groups. Key negotiating blocks, such as the EU, echo these corporate demands at the global talks.

Many of the corporate players lobbying today were behind the market-based mechanisms introduced in the Kyoto Protocol. They have succeeded in commodifying the atmosphere and delivering huge profits: world greenhouse gas markets were worth 38 billion euros in the first half of 2008. But carbon markets have until now failed to reduce emissions, and also cause many other problems. The EU Emissions Trading Scheme, the flagship carbon market, has failed miserably, primarily as a result of lobbying by the same corporations to get free permits, undermining the scheme.

Carbon offsetting has allowed industry to buy its way out of making cuts in carbon emissions at home by investing in supposedly clean energy projects. In particular the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), with projects in developing countries, has been shown to have damaging social and environmental consequences for local communities in many cases, with people displaced to make way for plantations or new power plants. Still, lobbyists for the WBCSD, IETA and others want to see the CDM extended to nuclear energy, forest conservation and even agriculture.

With the business wish list in place, even an “ambitious” agreement with tough targets will not have a chance. And given the growing evidence that carbon trading is not reducing emissions, negotiators should now be looking at other existing and feasible ways of dealing with the climate crisis.

The talks are anchored in market ideology. The conviction that business needs to be brought on board is deeply rooted, demanding mechanisms that cater to businesses’ economic interests. As Yvo de Boer said: “I firmly believe that the engagement of the business sector in fighting climate change is crucial. An international climate change deal for the post 2012 period should therefore be designed in a way that makes sense from a business point of view”.

The WBCSD among others have succeeded in turning the tide away from regulating polluting corporations to making business part of the solution. In the current negotiations corporations are being given a free hand to design the ‘solutions’. Ending the corporate capture of this process is essential if we are to move towards effective ways of solving the climate crisis.