Hawaii
Energy Policy Forum > 2002
Articles
At Development Talks, U.S. and Its Allies Clash Over Issues
of Energy and Pollution
Rachel L. Swarns
August 29, 2002
New York Times
JOHANNESBURG, Aug. 28 - For
days now, the battle between rich and poor nations has dominated
the United Nations talks here on the environment and development,
with marches and fiery debates over how to reduce poverty.
But one of the fiercest struggles has been raging behind
the scenes as the United States and the European Union clash
over strategies to preserve the planet.
The allies are battling over the question of targets
and
time frames for the conversion from oil and gas to
windmills and solar panels, for the cleanup of garbage
and
hazardous pollutants and for the preservation of endangered
plants and animals.
The European Union says these talks must produce a strong
plan with firm deadlines so the world's leaders can be
held
accountable for their actions. The United States opposes
targets and deadlines, saying it would rather finance
specific projects than support goals that might ultimately
prove meaningless.
The negotiators on both sides are still cordial. But
everyone agrees that the dispute has aggravated tensions
that have been simmering since President Bush angered
his
European colleagues last year by refusing to ratify an
international treaty aimed at preventing global warming.
Nowhere is that rift more visible than in the debate
over
renewable energy.
Scientists say the industrialized nations are endangering
the earth by using fossil fuels that contribute to global
warming. Renewable energy sources like wind power and
solar
energy produce smaller and more expensive amounts of
electricity than plants using traditional fuels, but
renewable energy sources generate a tiny fraction of
the
carbon dioxide and gases that are believed to accelerate
global warming.
Under the plan favored by the European Union, nations
would
commit to ensuring that renewable energy sources account
for 15 percent of the world's total energy production
by
2010. The United States has rejected such proposals.
Canada
and Saudi Arabia, significant producers of fossil fuels,
have also objected. With both sides digging in their
heels
today, the talks seemed deadlocked.
"We have
a range of issues - renewable energy, sanitation,
hazardous chemicals and the reversal of the decline in
biodiversity," Yvon Slingenberg, a senior member
of the
European delegation, said in an interview. "On all
of those
issues, we have not managed to convince them."
American officials dismissed such criticism. In the coming
days, the United States will announce programs aimed
at
providing clean water and reliable electricity in
developing countries. Action, they insist, matters more
than words.
"We have
maintained consistently that targets alone will
not deliver the energy services needed," said Griff
Thompson, the director of the Office of Energy, Environment
and Technology for the United States Agency for
International Development. "It's not the words in
and of
themselves that will electrify classrooms."
David Garman, an assistant secretary in the Department
of
Energy, said the United States was focusing on trying to
reduce the costs of renewable energy, which is still more
costly than coal or gas. "Renewable energy is great
because
it's clean," he said. "It also tends to be more
expensive."
But at the talks here, the United States has been
repeatedly, and sharply, criticized for refusing to commit
to concrete obligations.
Today Representative Dennis J. Kucinich, Democrat of
Ohio,
and Jerry Brown, the Democratic mayor of Oakland, assailed
the Bush administration's energy policy at a news
conference here. They called for a new commitment to
solar
power and an end to fuel subsidies.
"There are
people in the administration who will say, `We
don't need to talk about timetables,' " Mr. Kucinich
said.
"But when scientists can show that over a period of time
that global warming can, in fact, impact on the increase in
world temperature, we better be talking about timetables."
The debate, however, is more nuanced than some American
critics suggest.
The United Nations describes the United States as a pioneer
in renewable energy; it is already one of the largest
producers of wind energy in the world, even though the
technology is still costly. Even the European Union has
rejected proposals favored by environmentalists that
would
demand an even larger commitment to renewable energy.
"You can't
say that the Europeans are dashing around
reducing emissions furiously," said Gordon Shepherd,
the
director of international policy at the World Wildlife
Fund. "But they have acknowledged that they have
to.
They've sent a message that things must change."
Mr. Shepherd said he believed the two sides would come
to
some sort of consensus, even if it meant horse trading
on
certain issues. But negotiators were not predicting an
easy
breakthrough.
"We've not made any progress," an
American official said of
the negotiations today. Asked whether he thought the two
sides could bridge the gap, he shook his head and said,
"I'm not sure."
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