FRANCE: April 18, 2008
PARIS - A US plan to cap greenhouse gases by 2025 was dismissed as too
little, too late by some delegates at 17-nation climate talks in Paris on
Thursday while others welcomed it as a first firm US emissions ceiling.
On Wednesday, US President George W Bush unveiled a plan to halt the growth
of US emissions by 2025, toughening a previous goal of braking the growth of
emissions by 2012. The United States and China are the top emitters.
"The president gave a disappointing speech," German Environment Minister
Sigmar Gabriel said in a statement issued in Berlin headlined "Gabriel
criticises Bush's Neanderthal speech. Losership, not Leadership".
Many delegates at the US-led climate talks, on Thursday and Friday in Paris,
said far faster action was needed to avert the worst effects of global
warming. Most other developed nations are trying to cut emissions below 1990
levels.
"President Bush recognised the need for mandatory federal legislation to
tackle climate change but what he proposed ... will not contribute to the
effective tackling of climate change," European Environment Commissioner
Stavros Dimas told Reuters.
"The American administration is starting to awake," French climate change
ambassador Brice Lalonde said. "It's a bit late".
Bush will step down in January 2009 and Republican presidential candidate
John McCain and Democratic hopefuls Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have
all urged tougher caps on emissions than those proposed by Bush.
"We we are looking forward to whoever succeeds the present (US)
administration, because we believe we can probably only do better," South
African Environmental Affairs Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk told
reporters.
RISING SEAS
Projections by the UN Climate Panel indicate emissions by rich nations will
have to fall by 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 to avert the
worst effects of more droughts, heatwaves, floods and rising seas.
"That's the most extreme curve," said James Connaughton, chairman of the
White House Council on Environmental Quality. He said there were other, less
demanding scientific scenarios for addressing global warming.
"We try to steer away from rhetorical commitments that have no prayer of
being met," he told a news conference. Previous US data have suggested US
emissions could rise to about 30 percent above 1990 levels by 2025.
The Paris talks involve the United States, France, Germany, Italy, Britain,
Japan, China, Canada, India, Brazil, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, Australia,
Indonesia and South Africa. The European Commission, current European Union
president Slovenia and the United Nations are also attending.
The big economies account for 80 percent of world greenhouse gas emissions
and Paris is the third meeting of a series begun in September 2007 to work
out ways to contribute to a new UN treaty to succeed the Kyoto Protocol
beyond 2012.
Delegates are also examining the idea of a long-term aspirational goal of
cutting world emissions by perhaps 50 percent by 2050. Connaughton said
Washington had not given up on a 2007 promise to seriously consider such a
target.
The United Nations noted the UN Climate Panel reckoned world emissions will
have to peak in 10 to 15 years to avert the worst effects of warming --
before Bush's ceiling.
"It's good to have something on the table," Yvo de Boer, head of the UN
Climate Change Secretariat, said of Bush's plan.
"The science tells us we need to peak emissions in the next 10 to 15 years
and then reduce them by half by the middle of the century. ... So this [the
US plan] needs to be considered in that context," he told Reuters.
Story by Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent
REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
