The chances of emissions targets being agreed at the UN’s climate change conference in Bali were receding fast yesterday, with senior officials expressing concern that the talks were on the brink of collapse.

The EU is reportedly at loggerheads with the US, Japan, Canada and Australia over the roadmap agreement for the next two years of talks to agree a successor to the Kyoto protocol.

European governments remain insistent that the agreement should include a non-binding commitment for developed nations to cut greenhouse gas emissions by between 25 and 40 per cent by 2020 as the guiding principle for future talks. ...

However, the US delegation appears unwilling to change its position and has reportedly secured support from Japan, Canada and Australia. “Those who are suggesting that you can magically find agreement on a metric when you are just starting negotiations, that in itself …

European nations will boycott U.S.-led climate talks next month unless Washington accepts a range of numbers for negotiating deep reductions of global-warming emissions, Germany’s environment minister said Thursday.

“No result in Bali means no Major Economies Meeting,” said Sigmar Gabriel, a top EU environment official, referring to a series of separate climate talks initiated by President Bush in September.

The U.S. invited 16 other “major economies” to discuss a possible program of nationally determined, voluntary cutbacks in greenhouse gas emissions, as opposed to the binding targets favored by the EU and others now meeting in Bali.
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gBTCrOwOrOXV9BkLBDRmtO3XWbHQD8TGFO380

NUSA DUA, INDONESIA—As the United Nations climate conference here was drawing to its conclusion, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday acknowledged that the United States’ goal of deleting specific emission reduction guidelines from a draft agreement had succeeded.

“Realistically, it may be …

Autoherstellern drohen in Europa angeblich Strafen in Milliardenhöhe, wenn die Fahrzeuge beim Abgas-Ausstoß gegen EU- Klimaschutz-Vorgaben verstoßen. 

Laut einem Bericht der «Frankfurter Allgemeinen Zeitung» (Donnerstag) müssten die Hersteller schon bei einer Überschreitung der geplanten CO2-Grenzwerte um wenige Gramm zusammen mehrere Milliarden Euro zahlen. Das Blatt beruft sich dabei auf eine Studie der EU-Kommission. Deren Präsident José Manuel Barroso hatte Ende November bereits Strafzahlungen für wenig umweltbewusste Autobauer angedroht.

In der EU sollen Neuwagen von 2012 an höchsten 130 Gramm Kohlendioxid pro Kilometer ausstoßen. Für jedes weitere Gramm und pro verkauftem Auto habe die Kommission bei ihrer Berechnung eine Strafe von 95 Euro zugrunde gelegt, schrieb die Zeitung weiter. Sollten die Hersteller die Grenzwerte im Durchschnitt um 10 Gramm überschreiten, läge die Strafe bei 12,5 Milliarden Euro im Jahr. Das entspräche nach den Berechnungen der Behörde drei Vierteln der Gewinne der Hersteller, berichtet die «FAZ». …

What may be the oldest known remains of a polar bear have been uncovered on the Svalbard archipelago in the Arctic.

The jawbone was pulled from sediments that suggest the specimen is perhaps 110,000 or 130,000 years old.

Professor Olafur Ingolfsson from the University of Iceland says tests show it was an adult, possibly a female.

The find is a surprise because polar bears are a relatively new species, with one study claiming they evolved less than 100,000 years ago.

If the Svalbard jawbone’s status is confirmed, and further discoveries can show the iconic Arctic beasts have a deeper evolutionary heritage, then the outlook for the animals may be more positive than some believe.

Age ‘confidence’

“We have this specimen that confirms the polar bear was a morphologically distinct species at least 100,000 years ago, and this basically …

Gestern: German Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel said Tuesday that Germany along with the European Union would be fighting at the UN climate conference for targets to be set for reducing greenhouse emissions, but warned of difficult negotiations. “We cannot dare to go back home without clear targets for 2020 and 2050. At the core is the issue of bringing the Americans around toward a target.” http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/156782.html

Heute: A REFERENCE to non-binding targets is likely to be stripped from the road map for global climate change negotiations to be launched by the UN conference at Bali. The US, Japan and Russia are reported to be pushing hard for the removal of any reference to developed countries needing to make cuts of between 25 and 40per cent by 2020.  http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22916067-11949,00.html

Neues aus Bali: Sigmar Gabriel beschimpft den UNO Generalsekretär - und wird umgehend von seinem britischen Kollegen korrigiert. Keine Sorge: Der Bundesumweltminister wird, wie gewohnt, auch diese Klimakonferenz zu einem “Erfolg” und “Durchbruch” erklären - ganz egal was am Ende auf dem Papier steht.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon played down Wednesday expectations that a key conference on climate change will set a numerical target for reducing future greenhouse gas emissions. ‘For the international community to agree on these specific targets we may need to engage in further negotiations,’ he said.
http://www.abcmoney.co.uk/news/122007181319.htm

[...] German Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel — whose government has pledged to cut emissions by 40 percent by 2020 — said the Bali conference would be meaningless without targets.

“I do not need a paper from Bali in which we only say, `OK, we’ll meet next year again,’” Gabriel …

Pope Benedict XVI has launched a surprise attack on climate change prophets of doom, warning them that any solutions to global warming must be based on firm evidence and not on dubious ideology.

The leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics suggested that fears over man-made emissions melting the ice caps and causing a wave of unprecedented disasters were nothing more than scare-mongering.

The German-born Pontiff said that while some concerns may be valid it was vital that the international community based its policies on science rather than the dogma of the environmentalist movement.

His remarks will be made in his annual message for World Peace Day on January 1, but they were released as delegates from all over the world convened on the Indonesian holiday island of Bali for UN climate change talks.

The 80-year-old Pope said the world needed …

AUSTRALIA, the US, Japan and Canada are resisting pressure from the UN and developing countries to adopt dramatic targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions as a major split emerges at the Bali conference on climate change.

As business and industry warn of catastrophic economic effects if the ambit claims of 25-40 per cent emission cuts by 2020 are adopted at the conference, Kevin Rudd and his Climate Change Minister Penny Wong have declared Australia will not budge until it knows the full cost of adopting any targets.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22910382-5013871,00.html

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Australia, after its warm reception at Bali because of its ratification of the symbolically important Kyoto Protocol, is now getting a cooler welcome from the UN and environmental groups for not adopting the 25-40 per cent figures.

Australia, always the recalcitrant under the Howard government, is now being lumped with …