Greenhouse emissions: action or rhetoric

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/targeting-global-warming----new/story.aspx?guid=%7B28788F46%2DF9F7%2D4B2C%2D9E3B%2D1348E1CAB482%7D&dist=morenews

Targeting global warming
heated up among the world's leaders and the expiration of an international climate treaty draws nearer, evidence points to a rise in rhetoric rather than a rise in effective action to address the increasingly urgent problem of greenhouse gas emissions...

... while the White House has noticeably shifted the tone of its public statements and has lately been using its bully pulpit to spread the word on the need to address climate change, the Bush administration remains staunchly opposed to agreeing to mandatory emission cuts, setting the stage for yet another standoff between Washington and mandatory-control advocates.
The debate over mandatory emissions targets started with the Kyoto Protocol negotiated in 1997, which set cuts in greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide for the developed nations that ratified the treaty. The United States voted against ratifying the treaty.
The Kyoto agreement aimed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions of the ratifying nations by an average of 5% below their 1990 levels between 2008 and 2012 in an effort to stabilize global emissions. Negotiating the targets has been a thorny issue and meeting the targets for many of the countries that signed onto the treaty has proven unattainable.
Now backers of extending Kyoto are arguing for a new round of targets post-2012 and face a tough negotiation road ahead.
White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said recently the administration continues to oppose emissions targets like those outlined by the Kyoto Protocol, and referred to binding targets as "the old way" of addressing global climate change. "Goals" are the new way.
As the United Nations works toward a new climate change agreement in 2009, the United States must decide what long-term policy it is prepared to adopt to deal with greenhouse gas emissions. Can a policy that relies on goals instead of mandatory targets work? ....

European Union leaders have called for a more demanding 50% cut from 1990 emissions levels, when emissions levels were lower.
Last week Senators Joseph Lieberman, independent from Connecticut, and Virginia Republican John Warner introduced climate legislation to set up long-term greenhouse-gas emission cuts for the U.S. The bill would cut U.S. emissions by as much as 63% below the 2005 level by 2050. (U.S. carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels have increased 20% since 1990, according to the Environmental Defense, an environmental group.)...

Yet, the president continued to use general terms when speaking about emissions levels and cuts. "We must lead the world to produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions," the president said in his speech....

"What the administration is trying to do is use the language of goals to make it seem like they are serious about emissions," said Angela Anderson, vice president for climate programs at the National Environmental Trust. "You have to have something to back up that goal."
Democratic leaders such as Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., have criticized the administration's rejection to binding targets, calling the current policy one based on "purely aspirational targets and non-binding pledges."
"An effective domestic program, however, requires mandatory, market-based global warming legislation covering the full spectrum of U.S. emissions,"...

" legislative action on climate change from the deomcratically-controlled Congress before the 2008 election appears unlikely.
The White House has announced it will host an event next summer to discuss climate change ahead of the planned United Nations negotiations in 2009. Perino said the president wants to "get beyond the fights about Kyoto and to get to the post-Kyoto discussions." She said goals, not targets, remain the preferred option for the U.S and argued that a goal can be just as aggressive as a mandatory cap. (more)