U.S. Likely to Stand Firm on Emissions at Hawaii Climate Meeting

Hoping to show the world it really does want to do more to address global warming, the Bush administration this week welcomes leaders of the world's biggest economies to Hawaii to discuss climate change.

The two-day meeting in Honolulu is intended to build on guidelines forged last month at a United Nations summit in Bali, Indonesia for reaching a treaty by the end of 2009 on cutting global greenhouse gas emissions. The new treaty would replace the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012 and which the United States — the world's biggest per-capita greenhouse gas emitter — has never ratified.

The Hawaii meeting also is an important chance for the U.S. to mend international fences after it faced sharp criticism in Bali for its less-than-cooperative stance, observers say.

"The U.S. has reached the lowest point I've ever seen" when it comes to worldwide perception regarding environmental issues, said Philip Clapp, deputy managing director of Pew Environment Group, a research and advocacy group in Washington. "In the final session of Bali, we were abandoned even by our closest allies."

While the United States joined more than 180 other countries in Bali in agreeing to develop a new treaty to replace Kyoto, its negotiators refused to bow to pressure from the European Union and others to set mandatory caps on greenhouse gas emissions.

In a press briefing Friday, White House negotiators repeatedly pointed out that their goal is to work within the United Nations framework to iron out U.S. differences with other countries over mandatory greenhouse gas emission caps.

But they said the caps being pushed by Europe and other countries are still a major area of contention that they'll focus on in Hawaii.

Last week, the European Union passed a comprehensive plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent by 2020, with a goal of reducing emissions by 50 percent by 2050. The United Nations and other countries also support the goal of 50 percent reduction by 2050.

"We've got a lot of questions about the 50 percent proposal," said Jim Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. One, he said, is whether such a goal is feasible and how badly it might hurt the U.S. and world economy if passed.

Voluntary, not mandatory, caps has been President Bush's unwavering stance since taking office in 2001, and U.S. officials are expected to hold firm to that position in Hawaii.

Bush administration officials say mandatory emissions caps could hurt the economy and put the U.S. at a disadvantage to developing nations such as China and India that face less-stringent caps under Kyoto.

Instead, the Bush administration advocates "national plans that are appropriate for each nation," said White House spokeswoman Kristen Hellmer. "Those plans can be a combination of voluntary, marketplace or mandatory."

Ultimately, what the Bush administration wants may be a moot point. By the time a new international treaty is completed, the United States will have a new president.

But, Connaughton said, "it is the work we do this year that makes reaching an international agreement in 2009 possible."

Along with discussing the future of emissions caps, Connaughton and other U.S. negotiators in Hawaii plan to propose eliminating international tariffs on some 40 different clean energy products and services, making it easier for companies to exchange new technologies.

They also plan to discuss proposals to create and pay for an international technology fund to develop and deploy new clean energy technologies.

Patrick Michaels, a senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute, said pushing new technologies might eventually be one of the Bush administration's biggest contributions to addressing global warming.

Already, the White House and Congress have pledged to invest $4 billion annually in energy technology research.

"They realize that if one is going to try and do something substantial about the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, that requires a whole new suite of technology that we don't have today," Michaels said. "A lot of people want to just wave a magic wand and have everything be better ... but you just can't do that."

Andrew Hoffman, who studies business, environmentalism and sustainability at the University of Michigan, said the United States needs to introduce some substantive proposals in Hawaii, especially in the wake of the Bali criticism.

"If they come to this table without any kinds of sincere proposals to go forward, I think they're just going to open themselves up to more embarrassment," Hoffman said.

In Bali, the European Union threatened to boycott the Hawaii summit until the U.S. agreed to take part in a new round of global climate talks. Other countries booed the U.S. during the negotiations, and the representative of the island country of Papua New Guinea publicly pleaded for the world's biggest superpower to either lead or get out of the way.

Even former Vice President Al Gore complained, "My own country, the United States, is principally responsible for obstructing progress here in Bali," Gore said before adding — to the applause of many delegates — that a new U.S. president would be in place next year.

The White House's Hellmer said reports of criticism of the United States at the Bali meeting were overblown.

"We raised concerns along the way ... and we weren't the only ones," she said. "It just gets sort of played up in the press because we are the United States."

SUMMIT AT A GLANCE

What: Major Economies Meeting on Energy Security and Climate Change

Where: Honolulu, Hawaii

When: Wednesday, Jan. 30 and Thursday, Jan. 31

Who: Sponsored by the White House. Fifteen countries plus the European Union and the United Nations were invited.

Why: To build on climate change discussions forged at a United Nations meeting in Bali last month and at previous meetings of G8 countries. Observers say it's also a public relations move by the White House amid worldwide criticism of its environmental policies.