Obama committed to climate goals: Chu (AFP)

Political Climate Cant Stop Climate Change Initiatives
       AFL-CIO Industrial Union Council Director Bob Baugh is a member of a global union delegation led by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) attending the new round of United Nations Climate Change negotiations in Cancun, Mexico. This is the second of a series of blogs on the talks. Read the first blog here. Congress’s failure to pass Climate Change Legislation and the election of a conservative majority in the next House have led many delegates from o

US is committed to climate goals: govt
President Barack Obama is determined to meet US commitments to cut down on Carbon Emissions despite an election rout at home, his energy secretary told climate negotiations on Monday. Obama pledged at last year's Copenhagen conference that the United States will reduce the emissions blamed for Global Warming by 17 per cent by 2020 from 2005 levels. But a bill to require carbon cuts died in the Senate. "President Obama has said the United States will meet our Copenhagen commitments," Energy Secre...

Cancun climate talks surmount key stumbling block
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon headed to Cancun to offer a personal push in the Final Four days of the 194-nation conference.CANCUN, Mexico -- Talks in Mexico on a global climate agreement appeared Tuesday to get past a key stumbling block after China showed flexibility on allowing international verification of its efforts. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon headed to the beach resort of Cancun to offer a personal push in the Final Four days of the 194-nation conference, where a positive atm...

Anu Bradford: Just Say "No" to (Bad) Climate Deal
The Cancún climate negotiations to replace the expiring UN's Kyoto Protocol suggest that there must a real sense of urgency around the issue of Climate Change, considering the bruising that took place last year in Copenhagen. For those who are most concerned about Climate Change, another failure maybe the best possible outcome in Cancún. It is also the most likely one. Little interim progress has been made since Copenhagen on any issue. Deep differences remain among the negotiating parties i...

Cancun, Climate Change and WikiLeaks
Cancun, MEXICO—Critical negotiations are under way here in Cancun, under the auspices of the United Nations, to reverse human-induced Global Warming. This is the first major meeting since the failed Copenhagen summit last year, and it is happening at the end of the Hottest decade on record. While the stakes are high, expectations are low, and, as we have just learned with the release of classified diplomatic cables from Wikileaks, the United States, the largest Polluter in the history of t...

A warning at climate talks: Glacier melt speeding up
CANCUN, Mexico (AP) — The lives and livelihoods of people in South Asia are at "high risk" as Global Warming melts Glaciers in the Himalayas, sending floods crashing down from overloaded mountain lakes and depriving farmers of steady water sources, U.N. and other international experts reported Friday. Worldwide, "since the beginning of the 1980s, the rate of ice loss has increased substantially in many regions, concurrent with an increase in global mean air temperatures," the U.N. Environme...

Experts: Glacier melt speeds up, risking lives
CANCUN, Mexico — The lives and livelihoods of people in South Asia are at "high risk" as Global Warming melts Glaciers in the Himalayas, sending floods crashing down from overloaded mountain lakes and depriving farmers of steady water sources, U.N. and other international experts reported. Worldwide, "since the beginning of the 1980s, the rate of ice loss has increased substantially in many regions, concurrent with an increase in global mean air temperatures," the U.N. Environment Program ...

Is There a Plan B for Cancun?
The United States framed the agenda for the Cancun climate talks last month when it called for a “balanced” outcome from the negotiations. By that, it meant that it wanted to see progress on all key elements of the Copenhagen Accord. Most countries accepted that as a guiding principle for the talks, even if they were skeptical of its wisdom. But after eight days, with tensions remaining over transparency rules and the future of the Kyoto Protocol, it is unclear......

Huhne asked to 'bridge Kyoto gap' between nations
Britain's Energy and Climate Change Secretary, Chris Huhne, was yesterday handed the job of solving the key problem which threatens the collapse of the UN climate talks in Cancun. Mr Huhne has been asked by the Mexican organisers of the conference to try bridging the "Kyoto Protocol gap", between those countries that insist they will never sign up to a new period of Kyoto, the current climate treaty (such as the Japanese, Russians and Canadians) and those who insist that without a Kyoto extensio...

Barton signals he wont challenge Uptons Energy and Commerce victory
Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) on Tuesday signaled that he will not mount a challenge to the House GOP Steering Committee’s selection of Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) as chairman of the powerful House Energy and Commerce Committee next year. Barton, under the GOP’s procedures, could have sought a GOP conference vote on the Steering Committee decision when House Republicans gather Wednesday to ratify the Steering panel’s selections for committee leadership slots. But Barton - who is the ener

Japan to drop CO2 pledge if no broader climate deal
TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan threatened on Friday to drop a pledge to cut greenhouse emissions by 25 percent by 2020 if the Kyoto Protocol is extended without setting emission reduction goals for the United States and China. Developed and developing nations, gathered at a December 7-18 U.N. Climate Conference in Copenhagen, remain deeply divided on emissions cuts and legal details in talks to agree the outline of a pact to extend or replace the existing Kyoto Protocol. Many rich nations, including Ja...

Chu: Congress should consider nuclear in clean energy mandate
WASHINGTON — The Obama Administration’s energy chief asked Congress today to consider Nuclear Power and other nonrenewable sources in a mandate for utilities to use more Clean Energy, which could attract Republicans who’ve opposed focusing exclusively on Renewable Energy like wind. Efforts to pass the "Renewable Electricity standard" requirement have stalled in Congress, in part because of regional resistance. Opponents in the Southeast, for example, argue that their region la...

World Bank makes a play for climate finance role
By CAP’s Richard Caperton. Yesterday, a group of multilateral development banks - including the World Bank Group - made the case for their role in managing climate finance.  These banks clearly have the appropriate tools to move the significant amounts of capital called for in the Copenhagen Accord, but there are still questions about their ability to direct that capital to Climate Change mitigation and adaptation. Multilateral development banks - or “MDB’s”

Cancun Climate Change Quote of the Day
The Guardian is reporting that the Indian environment minister rebuked rich countries here at the U.N. Climate Change conference for failing to keep their promises to deliver $30 billion in climate aid to poor country by 2012. As the Guardian reports: [Minister Jairam Ramesh] said: "The grand bargain at Copenhagen was President Obama telling the four heads of state: do you agree on transparency in return for money which can start flowing to vulnerable countries? The question is: has the money s...

WRI Climate Solution Proposal at Cancun Gets Approval From Nicolas Stern
One problem besetting climate negotiations, both at Copenhagen and at Cancun, is a lack of trust. This is because there has been no consistent metric by which to measure progress globally. Each nation provides their own monitoring and reporting. The solution, just launched this week at the Cancun climate talks by the World Resources Institute (WRI), is an independent network that will track countries’ progress toward cutting emissions and providing climate finance, by convening independent...

Climate warning at Cancun summit
Ministers have begun talks at the UN climate summit in Cancun, Mexico, amid warnings that time is running out to curb Climate Change. Big differences remain between nations on issues such as cutting emissions, protection from climate impacts and inspections of others' emission curbs. It is unclear whether those issues can be resolved in the three days left. Mexican President Felipe Calderon congratulated negotiators for their work so far. Can 'Terrific ten' save the world? "T...

Carl Pope: Is America the New Becky Sharp?
Becky Sharp, Thackeray's anti-hero in Vanity Fair, lived beyond her means and rarely paid her bills, particularly those she owed to "tradespeople" who had provided her with basic but unglamorous services. Are we really ready to emulate her as a nation? Most Americans would find that distasteful. After all, we are the country that admired Finland for being the only nation to fully repay its World War I Debts to us. But the debate swirling around this year's UN Climate Summit in Cancun is as mu...

More Nations May Pledge Carbon Limits at U.N. Climate Talks
Monday, December 06, 2010 By Arthur Max, Associated Press Cancun, Mexico (AP) - More countries are expected this week to pledge specific actions to limit Carbon Emissions over the next decade, in what would be "very good news" for arduous negotiations on a Climate Change agreement, says host country Mexico. On Monday, newly arrived government ministers begin applying political weight to talks being held in Cancun, as the 193-nation U.N. Climate Conference moves into its decisive final week....

More Nations May Pledge Carbon Limits at UN Talks
CANCUN, Mexico -- More countries are expected this week to pledge specific actions to limit Carbon Emissions over the next decade, in what would be very good news for arduous negotiations on a climate-change agreement, host country Mexico said. As the talks began their second and final week Monday, delegates said the 193-nation conference was moving toward decisions on practical steps to help countries fight Global Warming, especially developing nations under severe threat from changing climate ...

U.N. climate talks move into decisive phase
CANCUN, Mexico (AP) — U.N. climate talks moved into their decisive week Monday with the agenda dominated by future cuts in Carbon Emissions and keeping countries honest about their actions to control Global Warming. Government ministers arrived in force to begin applying political muscle to negotiations that in the past week have narrowed some disputes, but which are likely to leave the toughest decisions for the final hours of the 193-nation conference on Friday. Delegates were feeling pre...

Tough UN climate talks move into decisive week
CANCUN, Mexico (AP) — U.N. climate talks moved into their decisive week Monday with the agenda dominated by future cuts in Carbon Emissions and keeping countries honest about their actions to control Global Warming. Government ministers arrived in force to begin applying political muscle to negotiations that in the past week have narrowed some disputes, but which are likely to leave the toughest decisions for the final hours of the 193-nation conference on Friday. Delegates were feeling pre...

If Cancun Climate Talks Falter, Blame the US
The most recent round of United Nations-led Climate Change negotiations began this week in Cancun, and although international expectations are muted this year, the stakes are still high. As Mother Jones‘ Kate Sheppard explains,"The 2010 meeting could make or break the future of global negotiations.” This is the sixteenth Conference of the Parties, convened by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). After the tepid results of last year’s conferen...

Experts: Glacier melt speeds up, risking lives
CANCUN, Mexico (AP) - United Nations and other international experts say the lives and livelihoods of people in South Asia are at "high risk" as Global Warming melts Glaciers in the Himalayas. The glacier melt is sending floods crashing down from overloaded mountain lakes and depriving farmers of steady sources of water. The U.N. Environment Program says that worldwide, "since the beginning of the 1980s, the rate of ice loss has increased substantially in many regions, concurrent with an increa...

W.H. open to nukes as 'clean energy'
The Obama Administration may consider caving to GOP demands to include nuclear and some coal production in a “Clean Energy standard,” Energy Secretary Steven Chu said Tuesday. A national "clean" or "renewable" energy standard would require utilities to purchase a percentage of their electricity from non-fossil fuel sources and is seen as one of the administration's few options for a broad Energy Policy following the death of the cap-and-trade bill. Continue Re...

Compromise spirit at climate talks in last days
CANCUN, Mexico (AP) - It may not last, but a spirit of Compromise seems to have settled over the annual U.N. Climate Conference as negotiators enter its final days looking for agreements on secondary tools for coping with Global Warming. The open sniping between the U.S. and China that marked periodic talks earlier this year was not in evidence Monday as the second week of the two-week meeting got under way. "There were heated discussions at Copenhagen. Here the atmosphere is relatively mild,"...