ETERNALLY MISMATCHED:

EU missing greenhouse gas targets (Roland Pease, 11/29/05, BBC)

The European Union is likely to miss its greenhouse gas targets by a wide margin, according to an official assessment of the Union's environment.

The European Environment Agency says that the 15 longest-standing members of the EU are likely to cut emissions to just 2.5% below 1990 levels.

This falls well short of their target 8% cut. [...]

On the other hand, the report does include a glimmer of hope - that if measures that have been promised are implemented, the Kyoto target will be more than met.

The trouble is that reality and promise don't seem to be matched at the moment.

At the moment.....

MORE:
US defends its efforts as climate talks begin (Beth Duff-Brown, 11/29/05, Associated Press)

Dr. Harlan L. Watson, senior climate negotiator for the State Department, said that while President Bush declined to join the treaty, he takes global warming seriously and noted that US greenhouse gas emissions had gone down by eight-tenths of a percent under Bush.

Watson said the United States spends more than $5 billion a year on efforts to slow the deterioration of the earth's atmosphere by supporting climate change research and technology, and that Bush had committed to cutting greenhouses gases some 18 percent by 2012.

Elizabeth May of the Sierra Club Canada, however, accused the United States, the world's biggest polluter, of trying to derail the Kyoto accord, which has been ratified by 140 nations.

''We have a lot of positive, constructive American engagement here in Montreal -- and none of it's from the Bush administration, which represents the single biggest threat to global progress," May said.

Sure wouldn't want them to follow our lead....

Posted by Orrin Judd at November 29, 2005 8:19 AM