CLIMATE TALKS for an itnternational agreement with the U.S. remain up in the air
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Currency wars have pushed climate talk even further on the back burner of the G-20 meeting in Seoul, Korea, this week as President Obama and other world leaders spar over the global economic recovery.
Attempts to convince countries to phase out fossil fuel subsidies -- a major goal of last year's summit -- appear at a standstill. Meanwhile, the midterm election that delivered House control to Republicans and gave the GOP a stronger voice in the Senate has created a string of question marks for other nations about the United States' commitment to international climate action.
G-20 leaders have scheduled one mealtime discussion on climate change -- largely at the behest of European leaders, analysts said -- because they were unable to get a formal agenda item on the issue. Alden Meyer, director of policy and strategy for the Union of Concerned Scientists, said he expects most of the questions in that exchange to be directed to Obama.
"I would expect leaders to ask Obama face to face at this meeting, 'Are you still behind what you committed to a year ago?'"
Obama vowed at last year's climate change summit in Copenhagen, Denmark, that America will cut its greenhouse gas emissions about 17 percent below 2005 levels in the coming decade and more than 80 percent by midcentury. The United States also promised to help mobilize up to $100 billion annually by 2020 as long as emerging powerhouses like China make good on promises to cut carbon, as well.
But cap-and-trade legislation died in the Senate this year, and the conventional wisdom is that it can't be revived for some years. That leaves regulatory action through U.S. EPA and other agencies as the only other avenue for reducing emissions. Mobilization of money is another challenge. House Republicans have vowed to cut $100 billion from discretionary spending.
The administration, through U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern, has insisted it still stands behind America's Copenhagen promises. It has not, however, laid out a road map explaining how it intends to get there. Meyer and others said the new landscape could have serious implications for how the international climate talks develop at the next major U.N. meeting in Cancun, Mexico, this month.
Talk about extending Kyoto without the U.S.
Up until now, much of the impetus in the international climate negotiations has been aimed at developing a new treaty to replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. The first commitment period of that treaty, which calls for emission cuts only from industrialized countries, expires in 2012. But with prospects of the United States' being in a political position to ratify any new treaty dimming, there is starting to be talk in European quarters about once again leaving the United States to sort out its domestic politics and in the meantime extending the Kyoto Protocol.
"These conversations are starting to happen because if you bring down Kyoto in the hopes of something else, that's looking less and less like a strategy," Meyer said. Still, he noted, countries like Canada, Australia and Japan would still need to build on Kyoto with some concessions from major developing nations like China in order to extend it -- another delicate discussion.
Meanwhile, work is moving ahead on the details of the package that negotiators are trying to develop at the next U.N. climate conference.
Luiz Alberto Figueiredo, Brazil's chief climate change negotiator, said he expects a "solid outcome" in Cancun.
"Copenhagen tried to define how the broad picture would operate. In Cancun, what we face is the challenge of how to translate the understandings that we had in Copenhagen into a more action-oriented result," Figueiredo said in a conference call with U.S. reporters.
"We understand that Cancun will not be the end of the road. It is going to be a steppingstone that will allow us to continue the work of perfecting and enhancing the international system for fighting climate change," he said.
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Add CommentThose kinds of reductions could be easily reached and even exceded, if the nation were to take a tip from the French and scale it up to address the issues, and institute a large scale effort to reduce petro-fuel consumption while building 100 nuclear power generation plants. While not an inexpensive solution, it would have the benefit of being money spent within our own economy on an improvement that we know with certainty will work and even make a profit when the regulatory landscape is matched to the scientific reality instead of it's being as it is now; having been crafted by nuclear paranoids using out of date and wildly exaggerated fears for guidelines, and that money, unlike the 700 billion that leaves the country every year to pay for our foreign oil imports, would secure for future generations our natioal status as a scientific, technologic and industrial leader. In the mean time, who knows, maybe some improvements in wind, solar and other alternatives will start to reach the levels of efficiency and productivity which they have promised for so long and still hope to deliver. Why, maybe we'll start building them in the US. Note that while we import most of wind turbines from China. Incidentally, China is actually going to build in the next few years 25 nuclear power plants and guess who is running that project? Westinghouse. American ingenuity seems to be popular everwhere but here in the US, as we sit on the curb bemoaning the fact that our shoelaces are tied together and don't have the coordination nor the gumption to untie or cut the knot.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI wonder if a year of Climategate exposing global warming as a swindle and the scientists and bureaucrats as corrupt have had any effect on world leaders? Our nation has had 40 years of this nonsense and the endless series of alternative energy frauds that can't be sold except at the point of the government's bayonet. Despite lurid fertilization of the barren fields of science and government with other peoples' money none of Jimmy Carter's silly ideas have borne fruit. Not a week goes by we don't hear of another exaggeration or overstatement, oopsie or outright lie peddled by scientists seeking to protect their livelihoods. Hopefully the new congress will use its investigative and subpoena powers to seek what else crawls out from under these rocks. Its about time for Congress to quit funding this nonsense and to let the proponents of global warming propaganda and fear tactics to pay for their own hobbies, rinky dinky sissy cars and sell this crap on the market if they can find buyers and investors.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe swindle that was exposed was the one perpetrated by those seeking to sink the Copenhagen talks. Full investigations were made of the charges in both England and the U.S. which totally vindicated the scientists involved. Interesting that we are seeing little sympathy for the kid that hacked Sara Palin's e-mail account - you know, the one that violated Alaska state policy - while the hackers that illegally obtained CRU e-mails have yet to be brought to justice.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI welcome a congressional investigation into validity of climate change. Let's investigate the companies behind the attack campaigns such as California proposition 23. This problem goes way beyond protecting the enormous fortunes of Haliburton and Koch. The attack on "the barren fields of science and government" is something that belongs in a third world country - which is something that the U.S. will become if it cedes scientific leadership to Europe and Asia.
when will the silliness stop? there is a warming trend, but it has no verifiable connection with human activity. stop the political agendas and go back to science.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe Global Warming, oh forgot now called Climate Change - only because they realised that global warming might not happen, groupies seem to approach the whole issue like a bunch of Bolsheviks. If you don't agree with us you are a criminal, don't allow any real debate, etc. What are they afraid of?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI believe we need to manage our environment to reduce or eliminate pollution and so we don't strip forest to nothing. Programmes such as Cap and Trade are nothing but a socialist plan to transfer wealth. The worst polluting countries over the last 50 years has been communist countries.
Read about Maurice Strong, one of the people behind the founding of Kyoto and the Rome club and one can't help but think the causes are political.
Even if one disregards the scientific evidence for global warming caused by human activities - which I don't, since I do follow the science - reducing CO2 emissions would still be a worthwhile goal because that would also mean reducing reliance on fossil fuels.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat the USA currently seems incapable of doing so means that their economy will become an even large train wreck than it is now once the gas prices start to get _really_ high.
The Climategate scandal was whitewashed. The supporters of the fox were asked to investigate if the fox had indeed gotten into the henhouse. And wow! They didn;t find anything out of the ordinary even, especially after turning their heads and only giving a perfunctory review of a minimal amount of data.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEven some of the founders of the American Physical Society are aghast at the scientific hujacking perpertuated by the Leftist/Green Scientific-Technological Elite.
Or, perhaps we should bring Inhofe and his ilk up on charges of crimes against humanity.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy would you welcome a congressional investigation? Do you really think that the average person in congress knows Kirchhoff, Planck, and Stefan-Boltzmann from Ben and Jerry?