Negotiators discuss 'differentiated' emissions cuts

Gore: America 'prepared to walk away' from bad treaty

December 2, 1997
Web posted at: 6:30 a.m. EST (1130 GMT)

KYOTO, Japan (CNN) -- Negotiators from 150 nations were working Tuesday toward agreement as to whether countries should be assigned differing levels of mandatory cutbacks in "greenhouse" gas emissions.

The discussions took center stage at the Kyoto climate conference, a day after the United States changed its position on how to set target levels for industrial emissions -- a move that pleased Japan and dismayed European nations.

On Monday, U.S. delegate Melinda Kimble announced the United States would consider "differentiation" -- setting different target levels for different countries -- instead of a uniform rate among the 34 affected nations.

"In the interest of moving our negotiations forward, and seeking to be as flexible as possible ... we are prepared to consider the possibility of limited, carefully bounded differentiation," Kimble said.

Also Monday, U.S. President Bill Clinton directed Vice President Al Gore to attend negotiations in Kyoto. Gore said America was "prepared to walk away" from a bad treaty.

The Kyoto conference was convened to strengthen the 1992 Climate Change Treaty by setting legally binding targets for reducing industrial nations' emissions of carbon dioxide and other "greenhouse" gases linked to global warming.

CNN's Tom Mintier reports

If it succeeds, it will set the energy course for much of the world for decades to come, helping change what we drive, how we produce electricity, even what we feed our cattle.

The more than 2,000 delegates at the conference must reconcile an array of differing positions on a long list of complex issues, chief among them the size of emissions reductions.

Reaction to U.S. shift varies

Washington came to the conference with the most conservative plan on the table.

Under pressure from U.S. business leaders, the Clinton administration proposed a modest schedule of cutbacks. U.S. coal, oil and other industries say energy restraints would cost hundreds of thousands of American jobs.

While some governments favor reducing the industrial world's emissions by as much as 20 percent below 1990 levels as early as 2005, U.S. President Bill Clinton proposed cutbacks only to, not below, 1990 levels, and only as of 2012.

Clinton proposes accomplishing this in the United States largely through fiscal incentives for energy-saving technology, and by establishing a system for trading emissions "permits" among companies and countries.

The Japanese delegation quickly expressed its satisfaction with the United States' position on differentiation. It has favored setting a range of target levels geared not to a country's gross emissions but, for example, to per-capita emissions, a measure that might favor an energy-efficient country like Japan.

But the European Union, which proposes a flat reduction of 15 percent among industrial countries, saw a possible ploy.

Delegate Pierre Gramegna of Luxembourg called the American shift toward differentiation "flexibility in the wrong direction. ... We get the impression the game is to find ever more loopholes." He is the European Union delegation head since his country now holds the EU presidency.

The Europeans fear the United States is maneuvering for a deal whereby it would have to reduce emissions less than Europe would. They noted that Kimble in her opening remarks also drew attention to a new Russian plan to accept essentially whatever targets that governments set for themselves.

U.S. negotiator Mark Hambley told reporters the United States has not settled on criteria for establishing differing targets. It "demands further exploration," he said.

Environmentalists were wary of the U.S. shift.

"It's a significant development in the negotiations," said Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists, an American group. Now, he said, all depends "on where the other shoe drops" -- that is, how U.S. negotiators define differentiation.

John Mate of Greenpeace described the U.S. position as "unacceptable, outrageous."

Bursting Europe's bubble?

Melinda Kimble

Kimble also expressed "strong concerns about the proposed EU 'bubble.'"

Under the EU "bubble" plan, the bloc as a whole, rather than individual countries, would cut emissions by 15 percent from 1990 levels by 2010.

Kimble said the EU plan needed further explanation in five areas, including what happens if more nations join the bloc.

She later told reporters that by allowing some EU members to even increase their emissions, balancing them with cuts by others, there was not a "level playing field."

She said that as there was an economic cost to nations in cutting emissions, the United States could be at a trading disadvantage.

EU spokesman Jorgen Henningsen, director for the environment and natural resources, shot back that Washington seemed perturbed by the EU's ambitions for the environment.

"If the strong concerns ... are the fact that the EU position is uncomfortably ambitious for the U.S., then I would say we have a comparable concern that the U.S. position is uncomfortably unambitious from our point of view," Henningsen said.

Gore to attend conference

Clinton raised the stakes in the global warming talks Monday by announcing his vice president would attend the negotiations. Gore, the Clinton administration's top voice on environmental issues, had put off the decision until the last minute.

Gore plans to address the 1,500 delegates during a one-day visit next week. But negotiations would be left to Undersecretary of State Stuart E. Eizenstat, who heads the U.S. delegation.

Gore was expected to arrive next Monday for the address, perhaps meeting with one or two delegations.

Gore has long been considering whether to attend the talks. The decision puts him in the awkward political position of defending a U.S. environmental policy that is considered weak by Europeans and Japan.

"This is an issue he has worked long and hard on and cares passionately about," spokeswoman Ginny Terzano said. "He's going out there to make a case for the United States' position."

Gore's political advisers feared that sending the vice president to Japan could backfire if the negotiations don't yield tough new restrictions on emissions. Environmental groups pushing for strict limits are the core of Gore's political base as he tries to succeed Clinton in 2001.

In another development Monday, Canada became the last major industrial country to announce its position on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The government said it will push for greenhouse gases to be reduced 3 percent from 1990 levels by the year 2010. It set a target for the stabilization of the release of greenhouse gases by 2007.

Merely to recommend, not to dictate

Whatever the final target, the "Kyoto Protocol" is expected to merely recommend, not dictate, how governments arrive there. Negotiators from 150 countries are attending the conference.

Topping the list of measures probably would be conversion of power plants from coal- and oil-burning to more climate-friendly natural gas, and encouragement of new fuel-efficient technologies for automobiles. But new policies likely would even reach down to the farm, where improved feed could reduce methane, a byproduct of cattle's digestive process.

Carbon dioxide, methane and other gases, mostly products of burning fossil fuels, allow sunlight through to Earth but trap the heat the planet emits back toward space.

In 1995, an authoritative international panel of scientists concluded that the buildup of such gases in the atmosphere since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution apparently was at least partly responsible for a 1-degree rise in average global temperatures in the past century.

The scientists predicted emissions continuing at current rates would boost temperatures much more in the 21st century, disrupting climate in potentially damaging ways and raising sea levels as glaciers melt and oceans expand from warmth.

Eight rounds of preliminary talks since 1995 have led to the Kyoto conference, which has also attracted 3,500 journalists and a like number of environmentalists and members of other advocacy groups.

Correspondent Tom Mintier, The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

Causes  |  Signs  |  Hot Air?  |  Economic Stakes  |  Disagreements
Related Sites  |  Message Boards

---

 

---

Sound off on our message boards You said it...

© 1997 Cable News Network, Inc.
All Rights Reserved.

Terms under which this service is provided to you.