As the international community braces for the 2012 expiration of the Kyoto Protocol—the guiding legal treaty on global greenhouse gas emissions—a group of scholars will meet at Washington University to explore how the United States will assume a role in the future of environmental protection.

The conference, titled “International Climate Change: Post-Kyoto Challenges,” will feature faculty from the law school and engineering school, as well as nationally recognized professors. The conference is open to all University students and members of the local St. Louis community.

“The main purpose is to raise these issues for the campus and local community and to get people talking and thinking about issues of our collective future,” Maxine Lipeles, senior lecturer in the law school and head of the Environmental Law Clinic, said.

Lipeles, who will be moderating the upcoming program, explained that the Kyoto Protocol, which sets greenhouse gas emission limits for all 182 participating countries, will expire in fewer than four years. At this point, no successor treaty has been finalized, though parties are currently negotiating a prospective agreement.

While Kyoto dictates the emissions of most countries, the protocol does not subject the two largest emitters of carbon dioxide—the United States and China—to its provisions.

In 1997, before the treaty was made international law, the U.S. Senate unanimously voted down the Kyoto agreement, since it did not impose emission regulations on China. Many in the global community did not consider China, a “developing country” immediately accountable to the treaty.

Determining how the United States and China figure into an emission reduction program will be central to all future negotiations. This will be the main question that the conference will address, Lipeles said.

“That’s the main focus of this conference: What role should the U.S. and China play in a post-Kyoto agreement?” Lipeles said.

Senior Kelley Greenman, an environmental studies major, has already taken steps to address the issue herself. Last December, she attended the annual United Nations conference on climate change as part of a national student delegation that offered its own policy proposals.

Greenman said she believes that the conference at the University will serve primarily to inform students of an issue that will shape both domestic and international environmental policy.

“We’re not a part of Kyoto and as of yet we’re not a part of post-Kyoto,” Greenman said of the United States. “I think getting the word out and educating people enough so they can make the right decision is imperative.”

Looking back to 1997, when the original Kyoto Protocol was under consideration, Greenman faulted the lack of public knowledge of the consequences of the United States’ refusal to ratify the treaty.

“It was unpopular to the American people and American government, and that’s why people have to get educated now,” Greenman said.

Regardless of how future agreements treat China, Greenman said she believes the United States must sign on.

“Ideally, it will include China,” Greenman said. “But if it doesn’t, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be a part of the agreement.”

Beyond the policy discussion, the conference will also feature a panel on careers in environmental law.

“I think that will be particularly interesting to undergrads to see ways they can make a difference and be successful,” Lipeles said.

Students seeking more information on the climate change program, which will be held in Anheuser Busch Hall and Seigle Hall on Oct. 30, can visit the conference’s Web site at http://law.wustl.edu/higls/indexclimate.asp.