Vienna meeting: US is talking, up to a point

IPS: Despite its new willingness to participate in a UN-monitored regime for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the U.S. government continues to oppose legally binding caps. Harlan Watson, senior climate negotiator for the U.S. government, told IPS in Vienna that his government "will come through with a national scheme for reducing GHG emissions. But we will not accept an international mandatory regime of emission caps."

The U.S., the world's largest emitter of GHG, has, together with Australia, refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, which sets mandatory emission reductions industrialised countries must comply with before 2012. Under the Kyoto Protocol, industrialised countries must reduce their GHG emissions by an average of five percent relative to 1990 levels. The treaty does not assign targets to developing nations with strong growing economies, such as China and India, which are also large GHG emitters.

Watson was in Vienna last week as head of the U.S. delegation at the UN climate change talks to prepare for the summit scheduled in December in Bali, Indonesia. At the Bali conference, all countries will discuss new international emission reduction commitments for the period following 2012, when the Kyoto Protocol expires.

…Watson's admission that the U.S. government is not willing to accept an international mandatory regime of emission caps confirms claims by environmental organisations that Washington's invitation to the major world economies to hold a round table on a new emission reductions regime next month is only a charade.

…Watson dismissed claims that the U.S. is up against other industrialised nations in its refusal to accept mandatory caps on GHG emissions. "Actually, there is much more that unites Europe and the U.S. than separates us," he said.