The Copenhagen climate summit is in disarray after developing nations walked out of the conference early Monday, reports BBC. At issue: Whether Copenhagen will ditch the old Kyoto Protocol. That means the climate confab is temporarily suspended.
A walkout by poor countries was always an option, The Guardian notes, because they’re worried about getting railroaded with a last-minute agreement later this week.
If the conference does resume, the duel between the U.S. and China will again take center stage. The two biggest emitters of greenhouse gases are at loggerheads over emissions curbs and financing, notes the WSJ.
For now, China seems to be moderating some of its demands. The FT reports that China is no longer looking for money from rich countries such as the U.S., but it also has no plans to allow independent verification of action on climate change.
For all the progress that President Obama has made with China and India on climate change, he is constrained on the homefront: The Senate, which must ratify any treaty, is wary of giving any leeway to a “developing” nation with trillions of dollars in reserves, in the WSJ. But getting China on board is absolutely fundamental to making the Copenhagen agreement effective, argues the NYT edit page.
via blogs.wsj.com
By the way, I just love Typepad's "Blog it" "bookmarklet" [economic theory says that if you cut the costs of a blog post, then blog posts will increase].
