US Senate deals blow to global climate talks
WASHINGTON, July 24 AFP
- A year and a half after President Barack Obama breathed new life
into global talks on a climate treaty, the United States is back in a
familiar role — the holdout.
The Senate’s decision Thursday to shelve legislation on climate
change is certain to cast a long shadow over December’s meeting in
Cancun, Mexico that will work on a successor to the Kyoto Protocol.
Obama’s Democratic allies acknowledged they lacked votes to approve
the first-ever US plan restricting carbon emissions blamed for global
warming.
The task is unlikely to get easier soon, with Democrats facing tight
congressional elections in November.
“This is going to change the mood dramatically in terms of what
countries are willing to put on the table in Cancun,” said Jake Schmidt,
international climate policy director at the Natural Resources Defense
Council, which backs action to curb global warming.
“This will seriously downplay what we can realistically achieve.”
Obama vowed to act on climate change when he was elected president,
sharply reversing course from his predecessor George W. Bush, who was a
sworn foe of the Kyoto Protocol, which he considered biased against
wealthier countries.
Obama’s climate negotiators enjoyed rousing welcomes when they
arrived on the scene — especially from the European Union, Kyoto’s most
enthusiastic champion.
The State Department, which leads international negotiations, said
the Obama administration still considered climate a “priority” and would
engage with other countries and with Congress.
“This is a global challenge and we have to resolve it through global
cooperation and joint action by all of the key countries and key
emitters.
We are one of them,” agency spokesman Philip Crowley said.
“And central to our ability to do our part is passing climate and
energy legislation.” The clock is ticking on sealing a new treaty, with
the Kyoto Protocol’s obligations for rich nations to cut emissions
expiring at the end of 2012.
Climate talks, including the contentious Copenhagen summit in
December, have been plagued by fighting between wealthy and developing
nations, which are both looking for clear commitments from the other
side.
Major emerging nations have resisted any legally binding requirements
to cut emissions and pressed first for industrialized powers to seal
their commitments.
“Countries like China and India are not likely to commit to any sort
of binding obligation if the US is not part of the discussion, part of
the negotiation and makes some similar commitment,” said Daniel Fiorino,
an expert on environmental politics at American University.
While the United States may be the most visible holdout, other major
developed nations have also grappled with controversy on climate change,
a major issue ahead of Australia’s August 21 elections.
Arabinda Mishra, a climate expert at India’s Energy and Resources
Institute, said the lack of an international treaty “has a real danger
in domestic will” in his country to invest political capital on fighting
global warming.
The Obama administration has authorized the Environmental Protection
Agency to regulate carbon, potentially offering a way to meet US
promises at Copenhagen to curb emissions by 17 percent by 2020 off 2005
levels. |