26 June 2007Financial Express
The US must begin to cut emissions of greenhouse gases before it can expect developing nations such as China and India to do so, California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said. President George W Bush has refused to commit the US to absolute cuts in emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases blamed for global warming, citing the potential damage to the economy.
On May 31, he said he would convene talks among the 15 biggest emitters, including India and China, in order to "set a long-term global goal'' for reducing greenhouse gases. China surpassed the US last year to become the biggest emitter of carbon dioxide, and that may make the US more reluctant to act before China does, environmentalist groups said.
While a world framework on cutting emissions should involve both India and China, the US needs to take the lead in fighting climate change, Schwarzenegger said today in a press conference in London with UK Prime Minister Tony Blair.
"We can't go to India and China and say, "This is what we want you to do, we want you to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, when we are in fact the one that has 5 % of world population and emits 25 % of greenhouse gases,''' thegovernor said. “We have to show leadership.'' In the absence of federal emissions cuts, US states are setting their own measures, Schwarzenegger said. He cited California's targets of reducing the output of gases to 1990 levels by 2020, and a further 80% cut by 2050.
Bush in 2001 rejected the Kyoto Protocol, the only global emissions-reductions treaty. Under the pact, 35 nations and the European Union committed to cut emissions by a combined 5.2 % from 1990 levels by 2012. The US and Australia are the only two major developed nations that haven't ratified the treaty, which gives no binding targets to China and India. A report by the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency last week said China has become the world's biggest emitter of the carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas.
The Dutch report "provides an enormous amount of fuel for those who are opposed to the US taking any action and can no longer hide behind the science: they will now hide even more firmly behind China,'' said Philip Clapp, president of the US National Environmental Trust. "The paranoia about China economically in the US is enormous, and the energy-related lobbies are cranking that paranoia up to a fever pitch.
"China's been a convenient excuse for them, and that excuse now in the eyes of the Bush people is perhaps greater than ever,'' Friends of the Earth Director Tony Juniper said in a June 21 phone interview.
