US guts G-8 Climate Goals

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The other half of today's reports of a worldwide surge in CO2 emissions is this Bloomberg news report that the Bush Administration has gutted the climate goal language in advance of the upcoming G-8 summit this June in Heiligendamm, Germany:

Items the U.S. wants deleted include a reference to limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit), targets for a reduction of greenhouse gases to half of 1990 levels by 2050, and language that says tackling climate change is an "imperative not a choice.''

Another edit proposed by the U.S. is the removal from the document of a statement that greenhouse gas emissions need to peak within the next 10 to 15 years, followed by reductions of 50 percent from 1990 levels by 2050. The Bush administration has rejected the Kyoto Protocol, the only international treaty that sets specific targets for emissions reductions.

The annotated draft also indicates the U.S. has requested other numerical targets be removed from the statement, including ambitions to increase energy efficiency in the transport sector by 20 percent by 2020, and raise the share of alternative fuels used in transportation to 15 percent by 2020.

Democratic leaders have, predictably, urged the President to back off this position. Given the emerging and unclear record of Congressional Democrats on fair trade and the environment...and on holding oil companies accountable in Iraq...citizens concerned about the environment should make clear to leaders on all sides in Washington that this gutting of climate provisions by the Bush Administration is simply unconscionable.

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Comments

eeff said…
first time I've been here

imagine that Bushco looking the other way on climate change
10:29 PM
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