By Andrew Grice in Hokkaido, Japan
After the criticism of their lavish champagne and caviar dinner, G8 leaders started to earn their corn today on the second day of their three-day summit in Japan. The club of the world's richest nations are trumpeting a landmark deal under which they agreed to cut carbon emissions by at least 50 per cent by 2050. The significant change is that George Bush, who a year ago would agree only to "consider seriously" such a target has now agreed to "adopt" it.
Gordon Brown has just hailed the breakthrough in a briefing for us travelling British hacks at his luxurious mountain-top hotel. [Note to Expenses Department: don't panic, we had chicken and chips last night]. "There has been major progress on the climate change agenda, beyond which people would have thought possible a few months ago," he said.
G8 leaders agreed a $150bn plan to encourage developing countries to "go green" so they will be more likely to sign up to the proposed global emissions cut. The hope is that they will stop building coal and oil-fired power stations and reduce deforestation.
As ever, the devil is in the detail. The green pressure groups are already attacking the deal for not going far enough. There are some important gaps: the G8 leaders failed to agree on an interim target for 2020 or the start date from which the 50 per cent cut would be measured. But their deal should give some much-needed impetus to crucial talks in Copenhagen next year on a "son of Kyoto" climate change treaty. If that happens, then the cost of the champagne and caviar will have been worth it.
The Climate Change Protocol is all about keeping the poor countries poor and the rich, richer. For example, how did the rich get to be rich? Well, but burning the blazes out of the earth. How can the poor countries get to be rich? By doing the same thing via industrialisation. Clever aye! No wonder, good ole GWB has finally dropped the penny and joined in.
Incidentally, cutting carbon emissions by 50% will have no effect on global warming as there is no reliable data that we are the cause of climate change. I wonder what these bunch of ratbags have up their sleeves for us...hmmmmnnn. Ah, get it! So they can tax the nuts off us through all kinds of green taxes!! It has already started with higher prices for air fares, etc. Trust me, by 2010, all countries in Europe will be taxing residents for clean air. Trust me on that, wanna bet? :))
Posted by: Dr John Bowers-Green, PhD (climatology) | Tuesday, 08 July 2008 at 10:39 PM