Poorer nations object to industry greenhouse curbs
By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent
PARIS, April 16 (Reuters) - Developing nations objected on Wednesday to possible curbs on greenhouse gases produced by industries such as steel or cement, telling U.S.-led climate talks that too strict standards could throttle their companies.
Other countries expressed worries that such targets, championed by Japan as a possible element of a planned new U.N. climate treaty beyond 2012, should only be a complement to big cuts in emissions of gases led by industrial nations.
Seventeen nations, the European Commission and the United Nations will meet in Paris on Thursday and Friday for a third round of a U.S.-led series of meetings to work out ways to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
On Wednesday, India led objections at a preliminary workshop reviewing whether industries could take on sectoral goals to help curb more heatwaves, droughts, floods and rising seas predicted by the U.N. Climate Panel.
Plans by rich nations to cut emissions of greenhouse gases "should not be diluted by a sectoral approach," R. Chidambaram, chief scientific adviser to India's government.
He said that there were some Indian industries that were among the cleanest in the world but others with far higher energy use. "You cannot develop a global policy that will throttle these guys," he said.
Brazil also told the meeting that the rich nations should focus primarily on cutting their own emissions.
The Paris talks are the third in a series trying to end criticism that President George W. Bush is doing too little to fight climate change compared to other industrial allies who have agreed to cut emissions by at least 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2008-12 under the Kyoto Protocol.
2025 GOAL
In Washington, an official said that Bush was planning to call for halting the growth of greenhouse gas emissions by 2025 -- far short of targets by most nations -- but would offer few details on how to reach the goal before his term ends in 2009.
"We believe a sectoral approach is a solution," said Olivier Luneau of cement maker Lafarge (LAFP.PA), saying that there was huge room for improvement across an industry where greenhouse gas emissions by the best producers are half those of the worst.
Richard Baron, of the International Energy Agency, said tougher goals for only part of an industrial sector, such as steel or aluminium, could then favour countries that escaped the curbs.
"The concern is whether the efforts... will be partly offset by increasing emissions outside the constrained region," he said.
Jean-Paul Bouttes of the World Energy Council said that it would be hard to get a deal covering power producers, ranging from coal-fired power plants to nuclear power. That was partly because of differing national regulations, and a range of national policies.
"A transnational sectoral agreement will be difficult to achieve," he said.
For steel, Hiroyuki Tezuka, of JFE Steel Corp, said emissions standards had to be global to work since 40 percent of the metal was traded on global markets.
With only regional rules "the end result would be disaster. Steel demand would be filled by high-carbon dioxide-dependent steel. This is why we need a sectoral approach," he said.
-- For Reuters latest environment blogs click on: blogs.reuters.com/environment/ (Editing by Keith Weir)
