8.  Consistently refuses to cooperate with world governments''  Rejection of Kyoto was only a beginning.  USA Today Online, AP

U.S. Rejects EU-Asia Emissions Reduction 

May 29 12:23 PM US/Eastern
By CONSTANT BRAND
Associated Press Writer        

BERLIN (AP) - The United States rejects the European Union's all-encompassing target on reduction of carbon emissions, President Bush's environmental adviser said Tuesday.

James Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, said the United States is not against setting goals but prefers to focus them on specific sectors, such as reducing dependence on gasoline and cleaner coal. "The U.S. has different sets of targets," he said.

Germany, which holds the European Union and G-8 presidencies, is proposing a so-called "two-degree" target, whereby global temperatures would be allowed to increase no more than 2 degrees Celsius—the equivalent of 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit—before being brought back down. Practically, experts have said that means a global reduction in emissions of 50 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Posted 2/2/2007 2:55 AM ET 
Full Original Article  

 Dems call climate report smoking gun, White House defends Bush record 

 PROJECTED TEMPERATURE RISES

USA TODAY staff and wires

WASHINGTON — A bleak United Nations report on global warming prompted finger pointing at the United States as a major culprit by some delegations and heated up political fires in Washington today over who is the blame and what to do next.

The report, issued today in Paris by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said global warming was "very likely" man-made and would bring higher temperatures and rising sea levels for centuries.

South Africa's Environmental Affairs Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk called the report "a wake-up call to the world's largest emitter, the United States."

"We are now beyond a critical turning point in the debate: those who continue to ignore the threat and its causes, or invoke half-baked arguments to confuse and obstruct, will be doing the greatest disservice imaginable to current and future generations," van Schalkwyk said.

"This report really provides strong weight behind those saying we need much stronger action" from the United States and other nations, said Robert Watson, the World Bank's chief spokesman on global warming and former chairman of the U.N. scientific panel responsible for evaluating the threat of climate change.

"These guys are saying now very unequivocally it is very likely due to human activity," he said. "This is a much stronger statement than we made six years ago."

In Washington, Democrats quickly jumped on the report.

"Although President Bush just noticed that the earth is heating up, the American public, every reputable scientist and other world leaders have long recognized that global warming is real and it's serious. The time to act is now," said Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass.

He, along with Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe, of Maine, is sponsoring one of a number of bills to tackle global warming.

Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., a senior member of House panels on energy and natural resources, said that "for those who are still trying to determine responsibility for global warming, this new U.N. report on climate change is a scientific smoking gun."

"The Bush administration, having seen the very real shadow of scientific evidence of global warming, has chosen to go back into its hole of denial by saying that it will not support measures to reduce global warming and its disastrous affects on our economy and environment," Markey said.

For its part, the White House issued a statement less than four hours after the report's release outlining Bush's six-year record on global climate change, beginning with his acknowledgment in 2001 that the increase in greenhouse gases is due largely to human activity.

It said Bush and his budget proposals have devoted $29 billion to climate-related science, technology, international assistance and incentive programs — "more money than any other country."

Soon after that statement was released, administration officials briefed reporters. They reacted enthusiastically to the report, hailing it as being in-line with government climate-change initiatives.

"The IPCC report marks a great day for the scientific body of knowledge on climate change," said Stephen Johnson, Environmental Protection Agency administrator. "As a life-long scientist, I am a true believer in the ability of science to improve our lives. I'm proud of the Bush administration's unparalleled $29 billion investment to study climate change science and to promote tax incentives. The administration has moved forward."

Both Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman and Conrad Lautenbacher, administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said that one of the reasons that the IPCC report is strongly supported by the United States is that the new document is based on much better climate models than those used for a 20001 assessment, thanks to research funded by the U.S. government.

"Where we are today is that rather than the uncertainties expanding, the uncertainties have been narrowed," said Johnson. "That's great from a science perspective. As a policymaker, it's much better and easier to make decisions."

Bodman said that embracing the IPCC report does not mean that the Bush administration will be proposing a cap on fossil-fuel emissions. "There is a concern within this administration that the imposition of a carbon (dioxide) cap in this country may lead to the transfer to jobs and industries to nations abroad that do not have such carbon caps," Bodman said. "We need a global solution."

Bodman also said the administration is trying to accomplish some of its climate change goals by using "market forces." He said, "This administration has consistently supported the view that both the challenge and the solution of this problem must be based on sound science. We must continue to develop solutions that are technically and economically sound."

Bush has called for slowing the growth rate of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, which averages 1% a year, but has rejected government-ordered reductions. Last week he also called for a 20% reduction in U.S. gasoline consumption over the next 10 years.

In Paris, Sharon Hays, associate director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy at the White House, said she welcomed the strong language of the report.

"It's a significant report. It will be valuable to policymakers," she told the Associated Press in an interview.

She stopped short of saying if or how it might affect White House policy on greenhouse gas emissions. "The report will stimulate discussion among the American public," she said.

Hays also said the U.S. delegation pushed successfully to soften the report's wording on whether stronger hurricanes can be blamed on human activity.

"The U.S. delegation went into the meeting wanting to be sure that the report accurately reflected the science," Hays said, without elaborating. "Earlier drafts were stronger in their language."

"I think it's hard to take the U.S. action on this as a signal of them changing policy," said John Reilly, associate director of research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change.

Reilly noted that "saying that climate change is almost certainly occurring and it's almost certainly due to human activity is different than saying the impact of climate change is so bad that we need to do something right away."

Mark Bernstein, a professor at the University of Southern California College in Los Angeles, an expert in climate change policy, says the new data may be enough to convince skeptics of the link between human activity and global warming.

Bernstein notes that it took a long time for the link between cancer and cigarettes to be accepted by the public.

But not all agreed with the U.N. report's findings. Republcian Sen. James Inhofe, of Oklahoma, has long labeled reports of man-made global warming a hoax.

"This is a political document, not a scientific report, and it is a shining example of the corruption of science for political gain," he said today.

Myron Ebell, director of global warming policy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank in Washington, D.C., called it "less alarmist in fundamental respects" than one issued in 2001, noting that the top estimates for rising temperatures and sea levels are lower in this assessment.

"All the hoopla saying that the further along we go, the more alarmed we should be is not justified by the report," he said. Ebell said the summary, aimed at policymakers, is more the work of governments than scientists. "These summaries have promoted things in the past that have been discredited," he said. "You can't believe it just because it has been announced."

Larry Schweiger, president of the National Wildlife Federation, however, said it was already "past time to act and solve global warming with the urgency and determination with which Americans have successfully confronted other threats to our security and to wildlife."

In light of the report's findings, some evangelical Christians, who were instrumental in Bush's re-election in 2004, called on the president to provide more world leadership on the issue.

"I am absolutely certain that as Christians we need to act today to curb global warming pollution," said Jim Ball, national coordinator of the Evangelical Climate Initiative and president of the Evangelical Environmental Network.

"It is a moral imperative that we act to protect God's creation, including the helpless victims of what the report indicates will be the decades-long impact of global warming," he said.

Contributing: Sue Kelly in McLean, Va.; the Associated Press.

Original Article  

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