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Last Updated: Feb 18th, 2008 - 14:39:01 |
MONTREAL (Reuters) - Negotiators at U.N. talks agreed to speed investments in clean-energy projects in the Third World on Thursday but remained deadlocked on ways to enlist the United States in a long-term fight against global warming.
About 160 nations at the U.N. climate talks agreed to streamline a plan meant to encourage projects such as hydroelectric power in Honduras and wind energy in China to help cut use of fossil fuels.
A draft decision to go to ministers at the talks, which are to end on Friday, reassured investors and Third-World nations that the so-called "Clean Development Mechanism" (CDM) would last beyond 2012, when the first phase of the U.N.'s Kyoto protocol runs out.
Under the CDM program, rich nations can invest in Third World clean energy projects and claim credits back home for reducing emissions of greenhouse gases. So far more than 40 such projects have been approved.
The draft urges nations to make "urgent" contributions to finance the CDM at about $18 million for 2006-07, up from $6 million in 2005. It also sets up ways to reform the program's management.
The novel project, part of the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol for reining in global warming, has been hit by red tape and a lack of staff to evaluate plans such as an Indian plant to generate power from rice husks or a Brazilian project to burn the woody waste from sugar cane.
If successful, some estimates say the plan might funnel $100 billion in investments to the developing world and aid a shift away from fossil fuels in power plants and factories, whose emissions are widely blamed for stoking global warming.
"This puts the CDM process on a much more professional basis," said Andrei Marcu, president of the International Emissions Trading Association. "This represents progress and a basis to work on."
The ministers were also struggling to break deadlock on ways to entice the United States and developing nations into long-term U.N. efforts to fight climate change.
The United States has defended its policy of investing billions of dollars in cleaner technology to reduce emissions, brushing aside calls for it to commit to long-term U.N. discussions on slowing climate change.
"One size does not fit all," Paula Dobriansky, the U.S. under secretary for global affairs, who leads the American delegation, told the talks on Wednesday.
Adding a sense of urgency to the talks is extreme weather, including Hurricane Katrina, the world's costliest weather-related disaster, which scientists warn could be a portent of things to come.
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