IEA's Mandil Says Post-Kyoto Now More Important
Date: 13-Nov-06
Country: JAPAN
Delegates from 189 nations are meeting in Nairobi for climate talks and to look for ways to extend the Kyoto Protocol, which requires 35 nations to reduce greenhouse gases blamed for global warming to at least 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2008-2012.
"That is tomorrow," Claude Mandil, executive director of the West's energy watchdog, told reporters in Tokyo. "Kyoto is almost over now. It is too late."
Despite the Kyoto reduction target, greenhouse gas emissions are rising in many industrial nations. Top polluter the United States pulled out while the number-two polluter China has no target.
Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Wednesday she would press during Germany's upcoming EU presidency for European agreement on a post-Kyoto regime to reduce greenhouse gases.
Finland, which currently holds the EU presidency, has said it is very important to avoid a gap between the expiration of Kyoto and a new regime.
Ministers at a climate meeting in Montreal last year promised to extend Kyoto with a new set of rules starting on Jan. 1, 2013. However, the UN conference taking place in Nairobi until Nov. 17 has been split on whether that meant a new accord should be struck in 2008, 2009 or 2010.
"The problem is, what's next?" said Mandil, in Tokyo to promote the IEA's annual World Energy Outlook, which urged governments to build nuclear plants and use greater energy efficiency to increase energy security and cut emissions.
Mandil told Japan's Trade Minister Akira Amari to further improve the country's energy efficiency -- already the best in the world -- and to help neighbouring nations to introduce Japan's technology for energy conservation, an official said.