World weighs climate treaty chances

President Bush: The US role at the Bonn talks will be critical

By BBC News Online's environment correspondent Alex Kirby

Delegations from more than 100 countries are meeting in The Hague to consider a compromise proposal designed to allow the Kyoto protocol on global climate change to be ratified.

Following US President George Bush's decision to renounce the protocol, the two-day informal meeting is attempting to come up with a new formula that will be acceptable to a full conference next month in Bonn, Germany.

Failure to finalise a deal there would threaten to derail an agreed timetable to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that many scientists believe are gradually changing the Earth's climate.

For conference chairman Jan Pronk, the Dutch environment minister, to preside over one international conference that ended in chaos and acrimony was a misfortune.

Russia will be able to sell its "hot air"

If he were to chair a second global meeting that ran off the rails, that could ruin his reputation.

So he is determined to steer next month's talks in Bonn to success, with no repeat of last November's fiasco in The Hague. The next two days may decide whether he succeeds or fails again.

By the end of 28 June, Mr Pronk will have concluded four days of informal talks on how to breathe new life into the Kyoto Protocol, the international climate treaty.

The Hague talks were supposed to finalise it, but they fell apart amid disagreement between the European Union and the US.

Testing the waters

Then, in March, President Bush announced that the US would in any case not ratify Kyoto.

He said it was based on flawed science, its requirements would hurt the US economy, and it unfairly exempted developing countries from cutting their own greenhouse emissions (arguments challenged by the protocol's supporters).

Officially, these two days of talks (also taking place in The Hague) are for the representatives of the 110 or so countries present to advise Mr Pronk on whether the proposals he has worked out for Bonn can succeed.

But two thoughts will weigh on most of those round the table: can they ratify the protocol despite the US boycott, and what part will the US decide to play at Bonn?

The protocol will come into force when it has been ratified by at least 55 of the signatory countries who together account for at least 55% of the industrialised world's carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in 1990.

In 1990, the US was emitting 36% of the developed countries' CO2, so in simple arithmetic it is clearly possible to get Kyoto ratified without the Americans. But although all the European Union members look likely to ratify, they will have to have the support of both Russia and Japan to make up the numbers.

Courting Japan

Jan Pronk's new compromise would allow industrialised countries to make more use of tree-planting to absorb CO2.

This is something the Japanese want, and it has been included largely to appeal to them. But it is not clear whether it will be enough to wean them from their traditionally close ties to the US.

Trees would play a larger part in the treaty

The Russians, understandably, want Kyoto to provide money they can spend on modernising their industries.

Their energy and economics ministries are working with the EU on plans to sell unused CO2 emissions credits, known as "hot air" (rights to emit pollution from fuel Russia cannot afford in the first place), and to use the proceeds on efficient energy projects.

So there may in the end be enough signatories to ratify Kyoto next month. But what about the US (it is taking part in this week's talks)?

Problems either way

Few observers imagine the Americans will be obstructive at Bonn. But even a constructive US could cause problems.

John Lanchbery is the climate change policy officer at the UK's Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.

He told BBC News Online: "The prospects for a good outcome at Bonn are high, but it all depends on how much the US participates, and in what spirit.

"If it comes up with a counter-proposal to replace the Pronk plan - easier emission cuts for itself, perhaps, or requiring developing countries to cut their own emissions now - that would certainly slow the process down.

"Mr Pronk cannot ensure the US will not wreck any deal. The negotiations could drag on for years."