PlanetArk 1 Feb 08;
HONOLULU - The world's biggest emitters of global-warming greenhouse gases met behind closed doors on Wednesday for a US-sponsored conference, as protesters pointed up Hawaii's vulnerability to climate change.
The two-day meeting is meant to spur UN negotiations for an international climate agreement by 2009 so a pact will be ready when the carbon-capping Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012.
Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, stressed that time was short to come up with a plan and said delegates to the Hawaii meeting need to take the lead. By midday, he said there was "no clear sense of direction yet."
"Nothing got accomplished yet this morning," de Boer said in an interview. "This was a first discussion on what is this process supposed to deliver, how can it contribute to broader negotiations."
He described a change in mood from the first round in September of these US-led talks among major greenhouse polluters, when many participants faulted Washington as isolated for its stand against the Kyoto agreement's mandatory carbon limits.
A global conference on climate change in Bali, Indonesia, in December and the "roadmap" it produced made the difference, de Boer said.
"I think people feel a lot more comfortable now given that there was an outcome in Bali establishing the issues that need to be part of both the negotiations and a post-2012 package," he said.
Andy Karsner of the US Energy Department, a delegate to this conference, agreed.
"I have been very pleased, in fact touched, by the sentiment in the room, that really reflects a changing of the mood, a turning of the page," Karsner told reporters. "It really exemplifies how significant the Bali roadmap has been in terms of all the nations of the world beginning to signal the areas that they will concentrate on over a very limited timetable."
CONCERN ABOUT US-LED PROCESS
Another participant, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there was some lingering concern about the US-led process.
Delegates from all the countries stressed that this meeting was meant to feed into the UN negotiations, not compete with them or undermine them, this participant said.
"I think it was mostly clearing the table of all the old dirty dishes," this participant said, referring to delegates' mention of the relationship between these talks and the UN negotiations. "There still are a lot of concerns from a lot of the people about this process."
The Hawaii meeting drew representatives of the richest countries -- the Group of Eight industrialized nations -- and some of the fastest growing, including China and India.
The United States has rejected the Kyoto Protocol, contending that its aim to set mandatory limits on carbon emissions from coal-fired power plants and vehicles unfairly exempts big emitters like India and China as well as developing countries such as Indonesia, Brazil and Mexico.
The Bush administration favors what it calls "aspirational" long-term goals to be set voluntarily by countries, but administration officials stress they support certain mandatory steps, such as fuel-efficiency standards and the use of alternative fuels.
In his final State of the Union address on Monday, President George W. Bush was applauded when he announced a US$2 billion fund to ease the transfer of environmental technology.
Several dozen activists demonstrated across from the meeting site, and nearby, others showed how high the ocean water would extend if there is a 39-inch (one-meter) rise in global sea levels, which some experts predict by century's end.
A column in the Honolulu Advertiser newspaper sounded a skeptical note.
"If the US finally drops its blinders and agrees to dramatic cuts in its greenhouse gas emissions, this meeting could be a defining moment in history. Or this meeting could be another nonevent, or worse, a cynical diversion," said the column, co-written by Jeff Mikulina, director of the Sierra Club's Hawaii chapter.
"It's more likely to be a speed-bump," Mikulina said later by telephone
(Editing by Philip Barbara) (For more Reuters information on the environment, see http://blogs.reuters.com/environment/)
Story by Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent
