Do carbon reduction targets work?

Yesterday Warwick McKibbin argued some countries which have set greenhouse gas reduction targets are not meeting them. That debate — and the related question of whether the Kyoto protocol is working in Europe — is continued on Global Dashboard, with a defence of Kyoto. Make sure you read down to the comments section of the post, which includes a reply from Kyoto critic Ted Nordhaus.

The Global Dashboard post also contains some good links; for instance, the broader question of whether a top-down target-based approach to emissions reduction works is addressed in an op-ed in Nature magazine, published last year.

I'm finding my thinking on this issue evolving rapidly over the last few weeks, towards a greater scepticism of large-scale, long-term initiatives like carbon trading. As the Nature op-ed recommends, the more effective answer might be a massive investment in clean energy R&D, though you could argue that a carbon price would be a good way to pay for such investment.

UPDATE: What he said.