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The announcement by legislators from the top polluting countries in the world that negotiations for the next round of emission cuts should end no later than 2009 is a positive development in the battle to slow global warming, said the global conservation organization WWF.
"The EU should decide at its spring Council meeting March 8-9, 2007 to set a target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent by 2020," WWF said.
That percentage is right on point with the intentions of the European Commission, the EU's executive branch.
Environment Commissionioner Stavros Dimas said today in a speech to the European Trade Union Confederation in Brussels, "In order to stay within the 2 degrees limit, the group of developed countries must reduce its emissions to 30 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 and between 60 and 80 percent by 2050.
EU Environment Ministers meeting in Brussels yesterday adopted conclusions on the EU's objectives for the future of international climate change action. These stress the urgent need for a global agreement on emission reductions, so as to avoid any gap when the Kyoto Protocol targets expire in 2012.
The ministers supported a target of emissions cuts to 20 percent below their 1990 levels and said that could be pushed to 30 percent below 1990 levels if other industrial countries sign on to a global effort.
The key is the willingness of the +5 governments, some of the most populous and polluting countries in the world, to cut back on their greenhouse gas emissions.
The Legislators Forum said it expects the G8 and +5 governments to identify, at the G8 Summit in Heiligendamm, "a measurable long-term goal to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere."
"Our belief is that this goal should be to stabilize concentrations at a level between 450 and 550 parts per million of CO2 equivalent," they said, "while recognizing that meeting the EU's 2 degrees Celsius target would require stabilization at the lower end of this range."
"To achieve this goal we will need a combination of a binding UN framework signed up to by all the major economies, together with bilateral and multilateral partnerships, recognizing the responsibility of developed countries to lead," the legislators said.
Limiting greenhouse gas emissions now will be less costly than doing so later, the legislators acknowledged.
"The World Bank estimates that adapting to the unavoidable impacts of climate change will require an additional US$10-40 billion per year," the Forum statement says. "If we do not act now to reduce emissions, this figure will increase dramatically and there will be severe impacts on public health and the availability of critical resources, including water."
"Adaptation needs to be mainstreamed into development policies and should be linked to overseas development aid and supported by integrated financial mechanisms," the legislators said.
"Energy efficiency is the most cost effective way to decrease greenhouse gas emissions," they said
U.S. Senator Olympia Snowe, a Maine Republican, is co-chair of the International Climate Change Taskforce. In her speech to the Legislators' Forum Snowe said, "I believe we are witnessing a sea-change in acceptance of the reality of global warming; the issue has intensified not only environmentally but also politically and, as such, has dramatically changed the prospect for passing climate change legislation substantially for the better."
"We have unquestionably reached scientific critical mass," Snowe said, "the question now is can we gather the political critical mass?"
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