US stands firm against mandatory climate change cuts

America refused to back down from its opposition to compulsory cuts in greenhouse gas emissions today.

The US, the world’s largest producer of the gases, has resisted calls for strict limits on emissions at the UN climate conference, which hopes to lay the foundations for a new agreement for when the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012.

It position seemed undermined by a committee decision in the US Senate to pass a bill yesterday cutting. Emissions by 70% by 2050 from electric power plants, manufacturing and transportation. The bill now goes to the full Senate.

But the US delegate in Bali Harlan Watson said that would not affect his position.

“In our process, a vote for movement of a bill out of committee does not ensure its ultimate passage. I don’t know the details, but we will not alter our posture here,” he said.

America’s isolation in Bali has increased following Australia’s announcement on Monday that it has reversed its opposition to the Kyoto pact and started the ratification process. The US is now the only industrialised nation to oppose the agreement.

Today the Australian delegation said it supported a UN document that mentioned cutting greenhouse gas emissions by between 25% and 40% below 1990 levels by 2020. The government has already proposed 60% cuts by 2050.

However, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd refused to commit to the 2020 figures, saying it was premature to set firm targets before he receives a comprehensive report he has commissioned on the issue, due next year.

The US Senate decision was welcomed by global warming campaigners in Bali. UN climate chief Yvo de Boer said it was an “encouraging sign” from the United States.

“This is a very welcome development,” Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists said. “It shows the increasing isolation of the Bush administration in terms of US policy on this issue.”

David Waskow from Oxfam said the Senate legislation was a positive signal to developing nations and others in Bali that America may be ready to assume a more active role in battling climate change.

“It’s one of the things that point the way to having the United States re-engage in the negotiations, and really I think in many ways demonstrates the US leadership on these issues,” he said.

Further momentum for serious greenhouse gas cuts, which experts say are needed to stave off the most destructive effects of rising temperatures, came from a petition released today by a group of at least 215 climate scientists who urged the world to reduce emissions by half by 2050.

“We have to start reducing greenhouse gas emissions as soon as we possibly can,” said Australian climatologist Matthew England. “It needs action. We’re talking about now.”

The United States and ally Japan are proposing that the post-Kyoto agreement favour voluntary emission targets, arguing that mandatory cuts would threaten economic growth needed to fund technology to effectively fight global warming.

Failure to reach a new international consensus on curbing emissions, experts warn, will raise the threat of catastrophic droughts and floods, increased heat waves and disease, and sea level rises caused by melting polar ice.