Word: protocol
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...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...
...more immediate concern will be the negotiations in Copenhagen. Since Reid's comments, environmental groups have been getting calls from foreign embassies suddenly unsure of where the U.S. stands on a global deal. What they want to avoid is a replay of the negotiations over the Kyoto Protocol back in 1997 - the U.S., led by then Vice President Al Gore, agreed to long-term carbon-emission reductions, only to be repudiated later 95-0 by the U.S. Senate...
...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...
...Developing countries refuse to do this. They say the hard-fought Kyoto Protocol, whose successor they will be working out at Copenhagen, is unequivocal in laying out differentiated responsibilities, and since the biggest polluters have yet to fulfill their responsibilities, the goalposts cannot be changed. But, they add, India will be happy to green its energy mix if the West provides the money and technology (this is the common position of developing countries - Brazil, India and China have all submitted proposals demanding that funds and technology flow from rich to poor countries to enable the latter to undertake mitigation...