KOBE, Japan (Reuters) - The Group of Eight rich nations will likely agree to an “aspirational” target for cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 but shun mid-term goals at a July summit, the top U.N. climate official said on Sunday.
Ministers and representatives from the G8 and major emerging countries gathered this weekend in Japan to try to build momentum for U.N.-led climate change talks, but remained at odds over who should do what when, and how much.
“Given the stage that we are in the negotiations, it’s going to be quite difficult to get an outcome of the G8 summit that is really strong,” Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, told reporters after talks among environment ministers from the G8 and major emerging countries.
“For example, it’s clear now that the consensus is for an aspirational goal for 2050 rather than a firm goal,” he said. “I do not believe that it will be possible at the G8 summit to agree a range of reductions for 2020 for industrialised countries.”
About 190 nations have agreed to negotiate by the end of 2009 a successor treaty to the Kyoto pact, which binds 37 advanced nations to cut emissions by an average of 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2008-12.
But with wide gaps within the G8 and between rich and poorer nations over how to share the burden for fighting the climate change that is causing droughts, rising sea levels and more severe storms, some saw slim chance of a breakthrough in July.
“I think it is difficult. We have not enough time,” Mexican Environment Minister Juan Rafael Elvira Quesada told reporters.
“But climate change is not waiting for any of us.”
Jos Delbeke, EU deputy director-general for environment, said ministers were likely to call for an “aspirational” target of halving global emissions by 2050 in a chairman’s summary to be issued on Monday. “It is quite likely that on long-term targets we will see a clear message,” he told reporters.
MID-TERM AMBITIONS
But big emerging countries like China urged the G8 to take the lead by setting ambitious mid-term targets before asking developing countries to make commitments of their own.
“I think the most important issue for us that we think will unlock the process to reach an agreement by the end of 2009 is the issue of mid-term targets by 2020 of between 25-40 percent below 1990 for all developed countries,” South African Environment Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk told Reuters.
“Countries that haven’t committed themselves ... the United States especially, should now commit themselves,” he said.
G8 leaders agreed last year to consider seriously a goal to halve global emissions by 2050, a proposal favoured by Germany, France, Britain, Italy, Japan and Canada.
Developing countries are putting priority on growth and balking at targets, and complaining that the United States, which with China is a top emitter, is not doing enough.
The European Union has said the bloc aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20 percent by 2020 from 1990 levels, but the United States says only that it will halt the growth of its emissions by 2025 and expectations are low for bold U.S. moves until a new president takes office next January.
Advanced countries also disagree on the base-year for mid-century reduction targets, leading some to suggest the quest for long-term targets be shelved for now.
“Our view is that since we cannot reach an agreement on the long-term, we can put it aside and focus on the mid-term goal, which is to identify what should be done by 2020, so we can take actions in time,” Xie Zhenhua, China’s vice chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, told reporters.
Participants stressed the need for funds and technology transfers to help developing countries adapt to climate change and limit their emissions, but some said much of the money would come from the private sector rather than from governments.
The U.N’s de Boer said “hundreds of billions of dollars a year” would be needed over the longer term.
Additional reporting by Risa Maeda and Kentaro Hamada
