Word: kyoto
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...behind. The world's biggest country is now its biggest carbon emitter, and its sheer rate of economic expansion - fueled chiefly by polluting coal - ensures China won't lose that spot anytime soon. While the U.S. earned the world's antipathy for refusing to sign on to the Kyoto Protocol, China, as a developing nation, had no requirements under that pact - and rarely seemed interested in stepping up to its responsibilities within the U.N. climate-change process. While the standoff between the U.S. and China - over who needed to cut carbon emissions and who needed...
...streets weren't the only place hit by gridlock. Negotiations over a new global climate-change treaty to replace the expiring and flawed Kyoto Protocol - meant to culminate at the U.N. climate-change summit in Copenhagen at the end of the year - have all but ground to a halt in recent months. Despite the election of U.S. President Barack Obama, who pledged to reverse eight years of climate inaction by former President George W. Bush's Administration, developed and developing nations remain gridlocked over who should be cutting carbon emissions - and who should be paying for it. Yvo de Boer...
...truth may be that Obama doesn't have much scope for substance, because he is to some extent a prisoner of Congress. The White House doesn't want to repeat the mistake made by former President Bill Clinton with the Kyoto Protocol by agreeing internationally to emissions cuts that have no support at home. That means Obama has to wait for Congress to act - and although the House passed a carbon cap in June, there's little chance of the Senate acting on the bill before the end of the year. That leaves Obama - and global climate negotiations...
...IPCC meeting in Copenhagen to replace the ineffective 1997 Kyoto Protocol will be critical for the world’s future, and the U.S. must show initiative in helping to develop a system of short- and middle-term targets and emission reductions for all nations, including developing nations. In such a system, the massively growing nations of China and India will play a critical role. Just as the United States doomed the Kyoto Protocol by rejecting it, the non-participation of any nation in the upcoming Copenhagen talks will sap it of its significance...
...stands, the chances of a new global deal being achieved in Copenhagen - one that would succeed the expiring Kyoto Protocol and include both the U.S. and major developing nations like China - are already looking dim. There are still major differences between the developed and developing nations over how the responsibility for cutting carbon should be divided - and how much the rich world should devote to poor countries that will need to adapt to climate change. "It's going to be a very difficult situation at Copenhagen," says Annie Petsonk, the international counsel for the Environmental Defense Fund...