By John H. Cushman Jr.
The New York Times
(This article is excerpted from one that originally
ran on December 7, 1997, during Kyoto.)
 If the Clinton Administration is struggling to strike a deal on global
warming at talks in Kyoto, Japan, that is partly because warring domestic
interest groups have spent many months-and millions of dollars-on highly
effective lobbying campaigns designed to limit the White House's options.
Environmental groups, traditionally closely allied with the Administration,
have succeeded in convincing the public that the threat of climate change
caused by emissions of greenhouse gases is a settled scientific reality
that must be confronted head-on. They say the Administration's proposal
for a treaty is too mild, and that a European alternative would be better.
But powerful business interests have emphasized the economic risks and
the need to bring developing countries into any binding new treaty, arguments
that have strongly influenced the Senate, where any pact must be ratified.
They say the Administration is going too far and too fast, the more so since
the Third World is balking at a bigger role.
The private-sector lobbying, more intense, prolonged and costly than
usual in the realm of diplomacy, has reached a fevered pitch this week in
Kyoto, but it has been playing out in Washington for years.
Because confronting global warming means altering energy patterns throughout
society, a solution to the emerging risk of climate change affects practically
every conceivable interest group.
Opposing a binding treaty are car makers and corn farmers, steel mills
and oil refineries, electricity producers, and the coal miners who stoke
their boilers. They claim that cutbacks in emissions would raise energy
costs sharply, rippling through the economy, creating inflation and destroying
jobs or sending them overseas. [TOP]
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Favoring a treaty are the main national environmental groups, who have
spent a decade putting the issue on the global agenda. Among their most
influential allies are businesses involved in conservation and renewable
energy.
"This is more than the environmental community has done on any
single issue in 10 years," said Philip Clapp, head of the National
Environmental Trust, an advocacy group set up three years ago to organize
sophisticated media campaigns on major environmental issues.
But Eileen Claussen, who was an Administration climate negotiator until
she left the State Department recently to work as an environmental consultant,
said that the industry campaign in Congress was especially effective.
"By targeting the Congress, the industries responsible for the
advertising campaign have widened the rift between the two branches,"
Ms. Claussen said. "This has had the effect of pulling the United States
farther away from most other countries in the negotiations, and hardening
its position on what would constitute an acceptable target and on what should
be required of developing countries."
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Furthermore, it was still unclear whether the United States, the world's
largest emitter of greenhouse gases, would show the resolve needed to lead
the world forward in remedying the problem.
"The betting inside the Beltway was that this was going to be a
train wreck," says Greg Wetstone, Director of NRDC's Legislative Program.
The betting was wrong.
Vice President Gore arrived on the seventh day of the ten-day conference,
bringing a renewed commitment from the White House to find a solution, and
instructions for the U.S. negotiators to display greater flexibility. This
gave the negotiations, which had been moving forward at a glacial pace,
the kick-start they so desperately needed.
Following a hectic and exhausting final few days, an agreement was finally
struck. It gives industrialized nations considerable latitude in selecting
cost-effective approaches to reducing greenhouse pollution, while containing
no loopholes that could undermine the agreement's effectiveness.
For industrialized countries as a whole, the Protocol requires about
a 5 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions below 1990 levels averaged
over the five-year period from 2008 through 2012. This requirement covers
all six major greenhouse gases, measured according to their equivalent warming
effect (or "global warming potential"), and therefore is more
comprehensive coverage than the original Japanese and European proposals
which included only three gases.
International emissions trading will allow industrialized countries
that have reduced their pollution output by more than the required amount
to sell their excess "emission allowances" to other countries.
In addition, industrialized countries can earn emission credits by investing
in projects that reduce emissions in developing countries.
Much remains to be done. Procedures must be designed to implement the
emissions trading and crediting provisions of the Protocol, and those procedures
must ensure that only true reductions are counted. Methods need to be developed
for measuring the net amount of carbon dioxide removed from the air due
to reforestation efforts. More progress must be made in securing "meaningful
participation by key developing countries"-a political requirement
before President Clinton is likely to submit the agreement to the Senate
for its advice and consent. Ultimately, the agreement must be ratified by
a two-thirds vote of the U.S. Senate. Gaining ratification will be a major,
uphill fight.
[TOP] |
Given this list of unfinished business, and the need to build political
support, ratification of the Kyoto Protocol isn't likely to occur for several
years. But the agreement itself has already sent a clear signal that business-as-usual
can't continue when it comes to energy.
By the year 2000, US emissions are expected to be about 13 percent above
1990 levels. This is a result of weak emission reduction efforts to date,
coupled with rapid economic growth, and the effects of very low energy prices
during the last several years. Studies by the Department of Energy and independent
analysts show that this trend can be reversed with advanced energy efficiency
and renewable energy technologies that can provide benefits which exceed
their costs. But the trend of rising emissions will only be reversed if
we get to work immediately and do it intelligently.
Fortunately, signs of change are all around us. In the short time since
the Kyoto summit, the Clinton Administration has proposed a $6.3 billion
Climate Technology Initiative to prime the pump for future binding emission
limits; U.S. automakers have announced major plans to develop advanced,
high-efficiency vehicles; and several major electricity suppliers have started
to market "environmentally preferable" generation portfolios that
include substantial commitments to renewable energy resources. As the new
millennium rapidly approaches, the prospects for a clean energy revolution
are brighter than ever.
Dan Lashof is a senior scientist and leading climate change
expert for the Natural Resources Defense Council. He answers climate change
questions online at
Come to save the
day: Vice President Gore's 11th hour
message of flexibility
broke the logjam at Kyoto. |
