OPEC wins praise for global warming stance

Adam Plowright, Yahoo News 15 Nov 07;

OPEC, the cartel that pumps 40 percent of world oil, won praise on Thursday for tackling the subject of global warming at its summit here, a problem it is more usually accused of exacerbating.

The 12-member Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries has made "protecting the planet" one of three headline issues at a meeting of leaders in the Saudi capital.

"I think the debate here points to a constructive willingness to participate in international dialogue about climate change," the UN's top climate change official Yvo de Boer told a press conference.

De Boer, who took part in a debate about energy and the environment, said that OPEC had shown "recognition that oil is a major contributor to the greenhouse effect, but also a willingness to talk about how oil can be produced and brought to market in a cleaner way."

The summit, only the third in the organisation's 47-year history, is to tackle the themes of "providing petroleum, promoting prosperity and protecting the planet."

Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Nuaimi, who chaired the debate with de Boer, the executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said the host country was concerned and ready to act.

"We (Saudi Arabia) are willing to participate with others to help in reducing world emissions because like the rest of the world we are concerned about the environment," he said.

Leaders of the 12 member countries of OPEC plus the president of Ecuador, who is expected to seal his country's return to the organisation, are to arrive in Riyadh on Saturday for two days of talks.

On Thursday and Friday, oil ministers and delegates were discussing the future of the oil industry.

Daniel Yergin, chairman of Cambridge Energy Research Associates and author of a best-selling book on the history of the oil industry, said the emphasis on the environment was "striking."

"This (the OPEC summit) is now part of a global dialogue looking beyond the identification of the issue (of climate change) and looking for solutions," he told AFP.

"Ultimately the answer is going to be finding the technology (to reduce emissions). It is clear they'll (OPEC) take part in it."

The leaders are expected to issue a joint communique at the end of their meeting, which OPEC Secretary General Abdullah al-Badri said would discuss the environment.

De Boer urged them to pledge to invest in carbon storage and sequestration (CSS), a nascent technology to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and he promoted an idea to set up a joint investment fund with money from OPEC producers, industrialised nations and developing countries.

A commitment to look at investing in CSS would be "very constructive outcome of the deliberations at the heads of state level," he said.

CSS, with which oil producer Norway, a non-OPEC member, is leading the way, consists of trapping carbon dioxide and storing it long-term underground.

"I think we are going to see a lot of money and funds being very focused on innovation technology (and) a wave of innovation building up," said Yergin.

Other ways oil producers can improve their environmental record include stopping a practice known as flaring, the burning of natural gas extracted from oilfields.

Many producers, including OPEC members Algeria, Angola, Indonesia and Nigeria, have signed up to a voluntary initiative known as the Global Gas Flaring Reduction programme.

Badri, who will travel to Bali for a crucial international meeting on climate change next month, stressed that extracting oil created a relatively small proportion of global emissions -- a position backed by de Boer.

"The part of producing oil (in greenhouse gas emissions) is not that high, the cost of consuming oil is," he said.

"(CSS) needs a lot of money, investment and research. Developed countries have the technology to take the lead."

OPEC Willing to Help Fund Climate Change Battle
Andrew Hammond and Alex Lawler, PlanetArk 16 Nov 07

RIYADH - OPEC is concerned about climate change and is willing to help develop ways to cut emissions such as carbon capture and storage (CCS), officials said on Thursday at a summit of the exporter group.

The group's Secretary General, Abdullah al-Badri, said carbon capture could be a solution and that OPEC would be willing to play its part to develop the technology alongside developed countries.

"This needs a lot of money, this needs a lot of research," Badri told reporters ahead of an OPEC heads of state summit on Nov. 17-18.

"Developed countries have the financial backup, they have the technological backup to take the lead. Also, we will try to contribute."

One idea floated in forums ahead of the summit was for OPEC, industrial nations and developing countries to each stump up US$1 billion to research CCS, a leading UN climate change official said earlier on Thursday.

"I'd be interested to see when the OPEC heads of state meet over the weekend, whether that's an idea that they pick up on," said Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

"If oil producing countries put the first dollar bill on the table then, to my mind, that makes it impossible for rich oil consuming countries to then not put another one next to it."

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries includes many of the world's top oil producers, whose economies are booming as prices hit record highs.


NOT A WAR ON OIL

Harmful emissions could be reduced if the carbon can be captured and stored, for example in depleted oilfields.

A UN study said CCS may be one of the best ways to cut emissions of man-made heat-trapping gasses blamed for global warming, but development has been slowed by high costs and legal and safety risks.

Environmentalists and other critics have said development has lacked urgency so far.

De Boer urged OPEC to take climate change seriously at its summit, ahead of a key meeting to tackle global warming in Bali next month.

"I encourage OPEC to contribute to climate change abatement and to play an important role in history to drive forward sound solutions to a global problem," he said.

"International action on climate change is a war against emissions, not a war against oil."

Adnan Shihab Eldin, a former head of research at OPEC's headquarters in Vienna, said CCS technology would be a winner for OPEC, the source of more than a third of the world's oil.

"OPEC stands to gain from a more proactive role to encourage accelerated development of CCS," he told a forum.

De Boer said December's UN climate change conference in Bali, where negotiations on a new international climate change regime are to be launched, will be a make-or-break point for international efforts to stop the planet heating up.

"If things go wrong in Bali then we really are in deep trouble. If you get a wake-up call from science now and don't act on it, then that means you are in trouble."

"There are strong signals that countries are willing to advance negotiations in Bali and come to a negotiating agenda." (Additional reporting by Alister Doyle, editing by Anthony Barker)

OPEC Must Tackle Climate Change - UN Official
Andrew Hammond, PlanetArk 16 Nov 07

RIYADH - OPEC oil exporters must take climate change seriously at their summit meeting this week, ahead of a key meeting to tackle global warming in Bali next month, a leading UN climate change official said on Thursday.


Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, told an OPEC forum in the Saudi capital he hoped the exporter group's leaders would discuss proposals for funding research into reducing levels of carbon in the atmosphere.

"I encourage OPEC to contribute to climate change abatement and to play an important role in history to drive forward sound solutions to a global problem," he said.

"They should continue to take climate change seriously," he said, speaking of heads of state from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, who are due to meet in Riyadh on Saturday and Sunday.

"International action on climate change is a war against emissions, not a war against oil."

OPEC includes many of the world's top oil producers, whose economies are booming as energy prices soar to record levels.

De Boer told reporters one idea floated in forums ahead of the summit was for OPEC, industrial nations and developing countries to each stump up US$1 billion to research carbon dioxide capture and storage -- removing gases from the atmosphere.

"I'd be interested to see when the OPEC heads of state meet over the weekend, whether that's an idea that they pick up on," he said.


FIRST DOLLAR BILL

"If oil producing countries put first dollar bill on the table then, to my mind, that makes it impossible for rich oil consuming countries to then not put another one next to it."

He said OPEC was looking to new technologies to help curb greenhouse gas emissions from oil: "They have rightly continued to focus on the idea that it's about addressing climate change and not about stigmatising particular fuels."

De Boer said December's UN climate change conference in Bali, where negotiations on a new international climate change regime are to be launched, will be a make-or-break point for international efforts to stop the planet heating up.

"If things go wrong in Bali then we really are in deep trouble. If you get a wake-up call from science now and don't act on it, then that means you are in trouble," he said, describing climate change as the most complicated issue facing the international community.

"There are strong signals that countries are willing to advance negotiations in Bali and come to a negotiating agenda."

But the UN climate chief said a solution must not cripple the developing world's economies and that nuclear energy would be key to handling the problem.

"I really feel we have to accept economic growth and the desire to eradicate poverty as a reality," he said.

"I have not seen a credible scenario to reverse climate change that doesn't involve nuclear," he said, citing the future energy needs of China and India, which each have populations of over one billion.

(Additional reporting by Alister Doyle, editing by Anthony Barker)