http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050623/ts_nm/group_environment_dc_3

Bush set to shun G8 allies on global warming By Alister Doyle, Environment
Correspondent Thu Jun 23, 5:52 AM ET

OSLO (Reuters) - Unconvinced that the world is warming,

President Bush looks set to shun pleas by his main industrial allies to
step up a fight against climate change at a Group of Eight summit next
month.

The July 6-8 talks will test how far other G8 nations, and big developing
countries whose leaders will also attend, are willing to stick to U.N.
schemes to curb emissions of heat-trapping gases without the United States,
the top polluter.

"The choice at the summit is a weak agreement or no agreement at all," said
Elliot Diringer, a director of the Washington-based Pew Center, an
environmental think-tank.

"There is no indication that the Bush administration is willing to move in
any significant way," he said of the Scotland summit, where climate change
and aid to Africa are top themes.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the host, says that greenhouse gases
from human activities may cause catastrophic floods, heat waves and storms
that could drive many species to extinction and push up sea levels by a
meter (three ft) by 2100.

He calls climate change "probably, long-term the single most important
issue we face as a global community" -- eclipsing threats like poverty,
AIDS or terrorism.

But a leaked draft of a final statement for the summit underscores a gulf
between Bush and Blair about the extent of the problem. It includes no firm
targets, timetables or cash.

WORLD WARMING

In a June 14 draft, the sentences "Our world is warming" and "We know that
the increase is due in large part to human activity" are in brackets,
indicating U.S. disagreement.

Many scientists are aghast -- the science academies of all G8 nations as
well as of China, India and Brazil said this month that burning of fossil
fuels in power plants, cars and factories seemed the main cause of recent
warming.

"I think the consensus is very, very strong and very compelling that we are
on a warming trend," said Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of a panel of more
than 2,000 scientists that advises the United Nations on climate policy.

"I do not despair," he added, pointing to measures by U.S. states and
companies to cut emissions of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, and
EU markets where industries trade carbon dioxide allowances as part of a
long-term scheme to cut emissions.

Environmentalists hail Blair's drive against climate change, even though it
always seemed wishful thinking that Washington might repay Blair's support
for the 2003 war in

Iraq by joining other G8 countries in capping greenhouse gas emissions.

"We think it's very important that (Blair) stands up to President Bush just
as he did to other leaders in the European Union budget debate," said
Jennifer Morgan, climate expert at the WWF conservation group.

Blair is isolated in an EU row about the bloc's finances.

Morgan said that Blair should ignore Bush and work with China, India,
Brazil, Mexico and South Africa, whose leaders will also attend, to start
mapping out long-term climate goals.

G8 nations Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Italy, Canada and Russia have
all signed up for the U.N.'s Kyoto protocol, which aims to cut emissions of
carbon dioxide by 5.2 percent below 1990 levels by 2008-12.

Bush pulled out in 2001, saying Kyoto would be too costly and wrongly
excluded developing nations. And the U.S. Senate on Wednesday rejected a
less demanding plan to cut U.S. emissions below 2000 levels by 2010, by 60-
38 votes.

However, the Senate did agree a non-binding resolution calling for a
mandatory cap-and-trade system to cut emissions.

Some scientists, mainly in the United States, argue that warming may be an
illusion caused by expansion of heat-generating cities. A warmer world
might create more clouds that would reflect heat from the sun back into
space.

"Surface warming is nothing to be worried about," said Fred Singer, head of
the U.S. Science and Environmental Policy Project. Bush's policies include
$5.2 billion in spending in 2005 on climate and energy research and energy
tax incentives.

Harlan Watson, the chief U.S. climate negotiator, said a U.S. drive to
clean carbon dioxide emissions from coal -- now one of the dirtiest fuels --
 and U.S. energy security were reasons to oppose emissions caps.

"Coal is around 55 percent of our electricity production. We have bountiful
supplies of 200 plus years of coal at current usage," he said. A sudden cap
on carbon would force power plants to shift from coal to imports of less
polluting natural gas.

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