US urged to set greenhouse cuts to help UN deal
* U.S. should set 2020 cuts even if Senate has not set goal
* UN, EU say urge U.S. to do more to help Copenhagen pact
* U.S. says working hard, with Congress
By Alister Doyle and Gerard Wynn
BARCELONA, Spain, Nov 2 (Reuters) - The United States should set a 2020 goal for cutting greenhouse gases to help rescue a U.N. climate deal due next month in Copenhagen, the United Nations said at a final preparatory meeting on Monday.
Delegates at the Nov. 2-6 Barcelona talks said time was fast running out to break deadlock over sharing out curbs on emissions between rich and poor and ways to raise billions of dollars to help developing nations combat climate change.
"We need a clear target from the United States in Copenhagen," Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, told a news conference.
"That is an essential component of the puzzle."
The United States, the top emitter behind China, is the only industrialised nation outside the U.N.'s existing Kyoto Protocol for cutting emissions until 2012. The U.S. Senate is debating a bill that would cut U.S. emissions by about 7 percent below 1990 levels by 2020.
Both Denmark, the host of the Dec. 7-18 talks in Copenhagen, and the European Union also urged President Barack Obama to do more to unlock a deal at the Copenhagen meeting from Dec 7-18.
"We have seen a significant, real change in the American position ... but we still expect more," said Swedish Environment Minister Andreas Carlgren, whose country holds the rotating presidency of the European Union. Washington said it was committed to a U.N. deal.
"The notion the United States is not making enough effort is not correct," said Jonathan Pershing, head of the U.S. delegation in Barcelona, pointing to a series of measures under Obama to promote clean energy and cut emissions.
CLINTON, BUSH
"Our view is that it is extremely important to be a party to this (Copenhagen) deal," he said.
Obama does not want to repeat the errors of President Bill Clinton's administration, which signed up for Kyoto but never got the treaty ratified by the Senate. President George W. Bush said Kyoto would cost jobs and set no goals for developing nations such as China and India.
Danish Climate and Energy Minister Connie Hedegaard said she found it "very hard to imagine" that Obama could collect the Nobel Peace Prize on Dec. 10 "in Oslo only a few hundred kilometres from Copenhagen and at the same time has sent an empty-handed delegation to Copenhagen."
Earlier, de Boer warned delegates in Barcelona that "the clock has almost ticked down to zero". With many nations hit by recession, negotiations on one of the most complex international treaties have stalled since they were launched in 2007.
Hedegaard rejected suggestions of giving negotiators more time in 2010 beyond Copenhagen. "You know it's not going to be any easier," she said, adding that not every detail could be solved when Denmark hosted the climate talks next month.
De Boer said he wanted Copenhagen to agree four elements: individual cuts in emissions for rich nations, actions by poor nations to slow their rising emissions, new finance and technology for developing nations and a system to oversee funds.
Outside the conference centre, protesters lined up hundreds of ringing alarm clocks to show that time was running out to reach a deal meant to slow rising temperatures and floods, heatwaves, wildfires and rising seas.
Developing nations such as China and India say that rich nations must cut emissions by at least 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 -- far deeper than what is on offer.
Developed nations say the poor must also do more by 2020 to slow their rising emissions. China, the United States, Russia and India are the top emitters.
(For Reuters latest environment blogs click on: blogs.reuters.com/environment) (Editing by David Stamp)
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