Based on my admittedly amateur reading of the research surrounding this issue, I have to go along with my country in its decision to call for more research before signing on to a plan that exempts some of the largest future pollution producers, third world countries, and imposes harsh economic restrictions on us.
An excerpt.
FEATURE-World's report on global warming:"Must try harder"
Tue 31 Oct 2006 23:03:04 GMT
By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent
HELSINKI, Nov 1 (Reuters) - More than a decade after world leaders pledged to avert "dangerous" climate change, a report card on their efforts so far might read: "Must try harder".
Rising industrial emissions of greenhouse gases, acrimony between Washington and many of its allies over policy and a report this week that the world economy risks a 1930s-style Depression by failing to act are among reasons for gloom.
Yet some see hope in widening concern that the use of fossil fuels is stoking global warming -- indicated by billions of dollars invested in "clean coal", wind or solar energy or by campaigns to get people to turn off unnecessary lights at home.
"Of course, we must try harder," said Finland's Environment Minister Jan-Erik Enestam, whose country holds the rotating presidency of the European Union.
"What we have in place at the moment is nothing more than a very modest start," said Yvo de Boer, head of the United Nation's Climate Change Secretariat in Bonn.
Even so, he added: "I think we've achieved a great deal."....
....Washington could hardly agree less."The Kyoto Protocol was enormously well-intentioned, it was trying to tackle a new issue, brand new, and I think it had some serious flaws," said James Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
"I don't want to denigrate the Protocol because it was important to have that conversation. But we can now learn, after 10 years of experience, about some of the more sensible and smarter strategies for going forward," he said.
