The Kyoto Protocol was adopted in 1997 in the Japanese city of Kyoto with the goal to reduce emission of greenhouse gases.

Under this treaty, industrialised countries have agreed to reduce their collective emission of greenhouse gases by 2012 with 5.2% from the level in 1990.

The national reductions differ depending on economical variables, current emission and willingness. The European Union is required to reduce its emission by 8% in 2012 from the level in 1990. The EU has defined the national reductions for its member states.

Limitations range from a reduction of 28% for Luxembourg, to a reduction of 6% for the Netherlands and a permitted increase of 27% for Portugal.

The Kyoto Protocol includes the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), which allows participating industrialised countries to reduce their emissions by investing in carbon projects in developing countries.

Also included is Emission Trading, which allows countries to buy emission rights from other countries which have not yet reached their emission cap.

Because costs for reduction are much lower in developing countries than in industrialised countries, these mechanisms allow the involved industrialised countries to efficiently limit the costs involved in emission reduction.

The project based mechanisms Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and Joint Implementation (JI) are designed to transfer capital and knowledge to Eastern Europe and the developing world.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a scientific body, established by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) for the assessment of climate change.

The IPCC does not conduct scientific research, but evaluates research published in scientific journals.