‘Beyond Kyoto’ greenhouse pact to be announced-U.S.

By Michelle Nichols

CANBERRA (Reuters) – The United States, Australia, China,
India and South Korea will unveil on Thursday a regional pact
to combat greenhouse gas emissions by developing
environmentally friendly energy technology.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick will make an
announcement with representatives from the other four countries
at the Association of South East Asian Nations Regional Forum
in Laos, a U.S. embassy statement said on Wednesday.

A U.S. official told Reuters the announcement would be
about the environment. An Australian government official said
earlier on Wednesday that the pact would be unveiled this week.

Australian Environment Minister Ian Campbell said on
Wednesday that the countries had been working on a pact to
tackle climate change beyond the Kyoto protocol, which requires
a cut in greenhouse emissions by 5.2 percent below 1990 levels
by 2008-12.

The United States and Australia have refused to sign the
Kyoto pact, which came into force in February, saying it
unfairly excludes developing nations such as India and China.
South Korea has ratified Kyoto.

“It’s quite clear the Kyoto protocol won’t get the world to
where it wants to go … We have got to find something that
works better — Australia is working on that with partners
around the world,” Campbell told reporters on Wednesday.

The Australian newspaper reported on Wednesday that the
pact was to be called the Asia-Pacific Partnership for Clean
Development and Climate.

“We need to expand the energy the world consumes and reduce
the emissions. That’s going to need new technologies, it’s
going to need the development of new technologies and the
deployment of them within developing countries,” Campbell said.

PROTEST

The Australian newspaper said the nations in the
Asia-Pacific pact accounted for more than 40 percent of global
greenhouse gas emissions, particularly carbon dioxide from
burning fossil fuels like coal in power plants and petrol in
cars.

Scientists say emissions need to be cut by 50 percent to
try and limit the impact of global warming.

“This is all about taxpayers’ money being diverted from
developing clean renewable technologies to try and make burning
coal less dirty,” Bob Brown, leader of the minority Australian
Greens party, said in a statement.

Australia and China are the world’s largest coal exporters,
while the United States is also a top exporter.

Greenpeace protesters forced the closure of the world’s
largest coal export port near Sydney for several hours on
Wednesday.

“If it’s an agreement about appropriate technology
transfer. It could be a useful tool, but not at the expense of
the only international agreement to deal with climate change,”
said Greenpeace Energy Campaigner Catherine Fitpatrick.

Japan, the world’s number two economy, appeared to welcome
the pact.

“From what we have heard, this partnership will not replace
the Kyoto Protocol but will complement it,” said an official at
the Foreign Ministry’s climate change division, adding that
Japan had already received calls for cooperation and was
considering the possibility.

A panel of scientists that advises the United Nations has
said world temperatures are likely to rise between 1.4 and 5.8
degrees Celsius by 2100, triggering more frequent floods,
droughts, melting of icecaps and glaciers and driving thousands
of species to extinction.

Scientists say the planet’s average surface temperature has
increased by about 0.6 degrees Celsius over the past century
and that the warmest decade of the past 100 years was the
1990s.

Researchers say further warming is inevitable because of
the huge amount of extra carbon dioxide pumped into the
atmosphere by man’s activities but the degree of future warming
hinges on how nations control their greenhouse gas emissions
now. (Additional reporting by Jon Herskovitz in VIENTIANE and
Masayuki Kitano in TOKYO)