Coalition of states claims climate change is still up in the air

Well, if U.S. President Barack Obama has learned anything in his first year in office, it's that there's no way to please everybody, no matter what. So, news from Washington today that 12 states had joined lawsuits seeking to block the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from regulating greenhouse gas emissions shouldn't surprise anyone. Lawsuits are one of the major ways that public policy gets done, especially when business interests are involved. Florida, Indiana, South Carolina and nine other states asked the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., on Thursday to block the EPA from issuing rules to control such emissions, according to the Reuters international news service. Their petitions join three filed earlier this year by Virginia, Texas and Alabama, Reuters said. The suits ask the EPA to reopen hearings on an "endangerment finding" it issued last year that greenhouse emissions are dangerous to people. The April finding, which became final in June, enabled the EPA to begin regulating greenhouse emissions under the Clean Air Act. Regulations expected to be issued shortly would require cars and light trucks to increase their energy efficiency. "If EPA doesn't reopen the hearings we will move forward to try to stop them from regulating greenhouse gases," said Brian Gottstein of the Virginia Attorney General's office, Reuters said. The states complain that the new rules are too heavily based on climate change reports from the United Nations that have been criticized for exaggerating some data. But 16 other states have petitioned to join the case in support of the EPA. The new rules are consistent with an Obama administration pledge to use regulations to curtail emissions if Congress does not pass a climate bill, which has been stalled in the legislature, Reuters said.

Obama admits failure at climate change conference

Well, at least we know they don't believe their own fantastic rhetoric. We're speaking, of course, of U.S. President Barack Obama's statement today that he understands why people view the just-concluded climate change summit in Copenhagen as a failure. "I think that people are justified in being disappointed about the outcome in Copenhagen," Obama said in an interview with PBS Newshour, according to the Reuters international news service. The conference ended with a nonbinding agreement to limit carbon emissions blamed for global warming, far short of a 50 percent reduction that was the stated goal of industrialized nations at the summit. But Obama, who was instrumental in overcoming sharp differences with China and India just to arrive at a nonbinding deal, said the fact that any agreement was reached at all was an important step. "Rather than see a complete collapse in Copenhagen, in whcih nothing at all got done and would have been a huge backward step, at least we kind of held ground and there wasn't too much backsliding from where we were," Obama said. "We were able to at least agree on non-legally binding targets for all countries -- not just the United States, not just Europe, but also for China and India, which, projecting forward, are going to be the world's largest emitters." Developing economic powers China, India, Brazil and South Africa, which were resistant to any deal that could limit their growth, signed on to the agreement at the last minute after Obama's personal intervention. "At a point where there was about to be complete breakdown, and the prime minister of India was heading to the airport and the Chinese representatives were essentially skipping negotiations, and everybody's screaming, what did happen was, cooler heads prevailed," Obama said. But many European participants had far less positive evaluations of the final agreement, however. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called the deal "flawed and chaotic" and Sweden called it a disaster for the environment, Reuters said. British Environment Minister Ed Miliband told the Guardian newspaper on Monday that China had "hijacked" emission-reduction efforts, but Beijing accused England of trying to drive a wedge between developing nations to force them into an unfavorable agreement, Reuters said.

Copenhagen climate deal turns out to be less than expected

Maybe this really was the best that could be achieved, and the agreement concluded the Copenhagen climate summit really is "meaningful and unprecedented," as U.S. President Barack Obama said Friday. "For the first time in history, all major economies have come together to accept their responsibility to take action to confront the threat of climate change," Obama told reporters, according to Cable News Network (CNN). And for what it's worth, that's doubtlessly true. But for people who were hoping world leaders would begin to take seriously the threat posed by a warming climate that is causing earth's glaciers to melt, Friday's agreement did not anywhere near far enough. Environmentalists want nations to agree to a binding agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which most scientists blame for the higher temperatures. Comparisons over the centuries are not possible because accurate records were not kept before the 1800s. Obama said the countries had agreed to keep emissions at a level that would allow temperatures to rise less than two percent annually, a goal that would slow but not stop the warming. This is going to be the first time in which (many countries voluntarily) offered up mitigation targets," Obama said. "I think that it was important to essentially get that shift in orientation moving." Reuters said. Obama reportedly worked closely with China and India, the world's largest developing economies that have objected to emissions limits that could impede their progress, to get them to go along with the new agreement, Reuters said. The deal requires nations to put their emissions-reduction commitments into writing for consultation purposes, after which they could become binding commitments, Reuters said.

Officials race the clock to get deal at Copenhagen climate talks

U.S. officials are working furiously behind the scenes at the Copenhagen climate talks to arrange a multination emissions-reduction deal that includes China, the Reuters international news service reported Thursday. Their urgency comes from the impending arrival of U.S. President Barack Obama, due to arrive tomorrow, and their desire to have an international deal done or close to completion by that time. "We're making progress on all of our outstanding issues with the Chinese," one official told Reuters. "We have a good dialogue going and there are other parties as well. "There's still a way to go on all the issues and there's not much time left, so we certainly can't predict at this point what the outcome of the conference will be." Obama is scheduled to address the conference and could be bringing a new proposal for developed nations to help pay for poorer nations to deal with the effects of rising sea levels due to global climate change. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the conference today that the United States would help raise $100 billion a year by 2020 for such a fund. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the United States thinks an emissions-reduction deal is still possible at Copenhagen, despite differences between developed and developing nations on the size of the restrictions and on verification that have limited progress so far. "We want something that works for both the international community but also that works for the United States," White House press spokesman Robert Gibbs told Reuters. "We think the elements are there to reach that agreement." Obama is expected to be at Copenhagen for less than a full day, Reuters said, because he wants to return to Washington to continue working on healthcare reform legislation pending in Congress.

Endangered polar bears get a little protection

News from Washington that the U.S. Interior Department had proposed protections for the entire range of the country's endangered polar bear population is yet another indication that the change at the White House signals major changes in policy for the world's most powerful military and economic giant. Thursday's announcement opens 60 days of public comment on the proposal, which designates more than 200,000 square miles of land, sea and ice along Alaska's north coast as critical habitat for the U.S. polar bear, according to the New York Times. A final rule is expected to be adopted June 30, 2009. Only 3,500 polar bears in the United States on land or U.S. territorial waters have been able to survive the loss of habitat blamed on global warming, which has melted the polar ice they live on. “Proposing critical habitat for this iconic species is one step in the right direction to help this species stave off extinction, recognizing that the greatest threat to the polar bear is the melting of sea ice caused by climate change,” said Thomas Strickland, the assistant interior secretary for fish, wildlife and parks under President Barack Obama, who took office in January. The previous administration under George W. Bush had declared the polar bear endangered due to melting ice and commercial activities but declined to take further steps to protect the creatures or their habitat, the Times said. If adopted, the new proposal would not remove the habitat from development but would require companies or government agencies to demonstrate that their activities will not negatively impact the species. Still, companies and environmentalists attacked the proposed regulations for opposite reasons. Commercial interests threatened to try to block the rules as being too broad and environmental groups complained they were too lax. In fact, the new rules are part of a settlement of a lawsuit filed by conservation groups that complained that the Bush administration had failed to designate protected habitat when it declared the polar bears endangered, the Times said.

Saturday night is lights out for planet Earth

It's going to be a lot more symbolism than substance today when nearly 3,000 cities and towns across the world turn out lights to express concern about global climate change. Major cities in Asia, the Middle East and Europe have already gone dark and it's only Saturday afternoon in the United States. "We think we are going to have 100 million people around the world sending a message that climate change is real, and we need to take action now," said World Wildlife Fund CEO Carter Roberts, according to Cable News Network (CNN). "The world is watching to see what America is going to do because if America acts on climate change, the world will follow." The participation of the United States in international agreements to address climate change is crucial because it is one of the leading producers of greenhouse gases, which are blamed for much of the problem. After helping to negotiate the Kyoto emissions reduction treaty in 1997, the U.S. famously withdrew from the agreement before it took effect in 2005. More than 650 communities in the Philippines, one of the first countries in the world to reach 8:30 p.m., participated in the Saturday's event. Lights began going out first in Sydney, Australia, birthplace of the Earth Hour idea in 2007. Hundreds of Australians lined Sydney harbor to watch the city's lights begin to go out, CNN said. Lights went out at monuments around the world, including the pyramids in Egypt, the Vatican, the Eiffel Tower and the Acropolis in Greece. But something tangible could be accomplished by the event. Organizers want to bring the global concerns to the attention of world leaders attending an international summit on climate change in Denmark later this year, according to CNN.