UN Experts Near Deal on Climate After Disputes
Date: 10-Apr-07
Country: BELGIUM
Author: Jeff Mason
"Conflict is a hard word, tension is a better word," Gary Yohe, one of the report's lead authors, told Reuters of the mood at marathon discussions in Brussels involving scientists and government delegates from more than 100 nations.
He said China, Russia and Saudi Arabia had raised most objections during the night to a 21-page summary which has to be approved unanimously and will guide policy in coming years on issues such as extending the UN's Kyoto Protocol beyond 2012.
Other participants said the United States was also among countries seeking to water down sections about damaging impacts from a warming widely blamed on human use of fossil fuels.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), grouping the work of 2,500 scientists, was behind schedule in a goal of publishing its summary at 0800 GMT. It will warn that global warming will hit the poor hardest.
Some scientists objected, for instance, after China tried to eliminate a note saying that there was "very high confidence" that climate change was already affecting "many natural systems, on all continents and in some oceans".
China, the second largest source of greenhouse gases after the United States and ahead of Russia, wanted no mention of the level of confidence.
Still, delegates sharpened other sections, including adding a warning that some African nations might have to spend 5 to 10 percent of gross domestic product on adapting to climate change.
Overall, the report will be the bleakest UN assessment yet of the threat of climate change, predicting water shortages that could affect billions of people, extinctions of species and a rise in ocean levels that could go on for centuries.
GLACIERS
It says human greenhouse gas emissions are very likely to be the main cause of warming. It also says climate change could cause a sharp fall in crop yields in Africa, a thaw of Himalayan glaciers and more heatwaves for Europe and North America.
In one section, the IPCC toned down risks of extinctions.
"Approximately 20-30 percent of plant and animal species assessed so far are likely to be at increased risk of extinction if increases in global average temperature exceed 1.5-2.5 degrees Celsius (2.7-4.5 Fahrenheit)," the text said.
A previous draft had said 20-30 percent of all species would be at "high risk" of extinction with those temperature rises.
US delegates rejected suggested wording that parts of North America may suffer "severe economic damage" from warming.
But it toughened some sections by saying "significant loss of biodiversity" was possible in parts of Australia such as the Great Barrier Reef by 2020.
The IPCC report says climate change is no longer a vague, distant threat.
"The whole of climate change is something actually here and now rather than something for the future," said Neil Adger, a British lead author of the report.
The report will be considered by leaders of the world's eight industrial nations at a summit in Germany in June in trying to work out policies beyond Kyoto.
Kyoto binds 35 rich nations to cut greenhouse gas emissions but has been undercut by a 2001 pullout by the United States. US President George W. Bush says Kyoto would cost US jobs and wrongly excludes developing nations such as China.
Friday's report will be the second by the IPCC this year. In February, the first said it was more than 90 percent probable that mankind was to blame for most global warming since 1950.
