Delegates from 182 Nations Begin Next Round of U.N. Climate Talks
Washington - Representatives from 182 nations are meeting in Bonn, Germany, for the second time in 2010 to grapple with a range of issues they hope to resolve before the next U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP-16) convenes in Cancun, Mexico, in November.
The climate talks, being held May 31 to June 11, began as the U.S. State Department released its fifth report since 1994 ? the U.S. Climate Action Report 2010 ( http://www.state.gov/g/oes/rls/rpts/car/index.htm ) ? to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the 194-party international environment treaty that drives the annual meetings of the conference of the parties (COP).
The report, technically called a national communication and required of all UNFCCC ( http://unfccc.int/2860.php ) parties, describes U.S. climate change measures and actions, policy initiatives and activities conducted mainly at the federal level since the previous report in 2006. It also describes U.S. government efforts to increase scientific understanding of climate change and help other nations mitigate and adapt to climate change effects.
In the lead-up to COP-16, the U.S. Congress is debating details ( http://www.america.gov/st/energy-english/2010/May/20100512175850KseviR0.186947.html ) of national energy and climate legislation that potentially could put a price on planet-warming carbon dioxide (CO2) for the world's second-largest emitter, after China, of greenhouse gases.
"The House of Representatives has already passed a comprehensive energy and climate bill, and there is currently a plan in the Senate - a plan that was developed with ideas from Democrats and Republicans - that would achieve the same goal," President Obama told an audience June 2 ( http://www.america.gov/st/texttrans-english/2010/June/20100602162730bpuh0.9531671.html ) at Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania.
He said he would work to get the legislation passed in the coming months.
"The next generation will not be held hostage to energy sources from the last century," he added. "We are not going to move backwards. We are going to move forward."
BONN CLIMATE TALKS
In Bonn, where more than 4,500 participants have gathered, two main working groups are meeting in parallel sessions. The working group on long-term cooperative action is the negotiating group responsible for delivering a long-term global solution to the climate challenge.
"Climate negotiations over the next two weeks will be on track if they keep focused on a common way forward towards a concrete and realistic goal in Cancun," the U.N.'s top climate change official, Yvo de Boer, said in a May 31 statement.
The working group on further commitments for Annex I (industrialized) parties under the Kyoto Protocol will discuss emission-reduction commitments.
Under the Kyoto Protocol, which 191 UNFCCC parties have ratified, 37 industrialized countries and the European community have legally binding commitments to limit and reduce greenhouse gases. These amount to 5 percent against 1990 levels over the period from 2008 to 2012.The first phase of the protocol ends in 2012.
The nonbinding Copenhagen Accord ( http://www.america.gov/st/energy-english/2010/February/20100218142001lcnirellep0.854397.html ) was produced at COP-15 in Denmark in December 2009 as a possible alternative to the Kyoto Protocol, but so far the protocol and the accord are both in place, with decisions to be made about them during preparatory meetings for COP-16.
U.S. CLIMATE ACTIONS
The latest U.S. climate action report describes the range of energy and climate actions taken since President Obama took office in 2009. Highlights include the following:
. Through the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the United States allocated more than $90 billion for investments in clean energy technologies.
. Joint fuel economy and carbon dioxide tailpipe emission standards for cars and light-duty trucks will boost fuel efficiency on average 4.3 percent annually and 21.5 percent over the 2010-2016 period.
. The Environmental Protection Agency plans to collect greenhouse gas emission estimates from facilities responsible for 82.5 percent of emissions.
. As part of the Copenhagen Accord, the Obama administration proposed a U.S. greenhouse gas emissions reduction target of about 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 83 percent below 2005 levels by 2050.
"Throughout the United States, Americans are taking action to address the grave challenge of climate change and to promote a sustainable and prosperous clean energy future," the report says. "These efforts are occurring at all levels of government, in the private sector and through the everyday decisions of individual citizens."
From 2005 through 2020, total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions are projected to rise by 4 percent and gross domestic product is expected to grow by 40 percent.
With mitigation measures beyond what is called for in the proposed climate legislation, the report says, by 2020 carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and other emissions would decrease significantly, and hydrofluorocarbons - climate-warming alternatives to ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons - would be subject to a targeted cap and phase-down process.
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