Canada confirms it will reject new Kyoto Protocol

– Wed Jun 8, 1:45 pm ET

SEE UPDATE AT BOTTOM OF PAGE


BONN, Germany (Reuters) – Canada confirmed on Wednesday that it would not support an extended Kyoto Protocol after 2012, joining Japan and Russia in rejecting a new round of the climate emissions pact.

The current Kyoto Protocol binds only the emissions of industrialized countries from 2008-2012. Poor and emerging economies want to extend the pact, creating a deadlock at U.N. climate talks running from June 6 to 17 in Bonn, Germany.

The confirmation makes it clear Canada is following the line its ruling party pursued ahead of last month's election.

"Now that we've finished our election we can say now that Canada will not be taking a target under a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol," Judith Gelbman, a member of Canada's delegation, told a negotiating session of the talks.

Canada has also previously said it could not achieve the binding emissions cuts it has committed to under the first round of Kyoto up to 2012, infuriating environmentalists and developing countries.

The U.N.'s top climate official, Christiana Figueres, said on Monday that the talks would now miss a deadline to launch a binding successor to Kyoto at the end of next year, because even if countries agreed a deal, they subsequently would have to be approve it in national parliaments in a lengthy ratification process.

The talks in Bonn were all but deadlocked on Wednesday on what items to include in the agenda of the meeting, and also over the long-running spat over whether or not to extend Kyoto.

Global carbon emissions last year rose at their fastest rate in more than four decades, up nearly 6% at about double the annual rate of increase over the past decade, data released by oil company BP showed.

(Reporting by Gerard Wynn; Editing by Jonathan Lynn)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110608/wl_canada_nm/canada_us_climate_canada

OH! Canada! NO

BY DEBORAH PHELAN, DAILYKOS, JUNE 10, 2011

Today's CAN Fossil of the Day Award(s) (AKA worst country in the world) goes to ... CANADA because the country:

• did not include emissions generated by the tar sands in its National Inventory Report
• WILL NOT take a legally binding target under a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol.
• announced it cannot determine if it can make its Kyoto I target until end of the 2014 assessment period  (read Anna Collins A good day not to be Canadian… from Adopt A Negotiator.

Officials from Australia, China, Lebanon, the United Kingdom and the Philippines were highly critical of Canada's policies regarding the Alberta tarsands, their insufficient investments in clean energy, and the manner in which they applied scientific methods to determine their GHGs.

"I was also struck that the colleague from Canada didn't refer to the tarsands issue or at least only once in passing," said Peter Betts, the lead European Union negotiator and a director at the United Kingdom's Department of Energy and Climate Change, during the session. "This has been an issue featured much in the press, and I know there have been allegations from the press that the emissions from that sector have not been included in Canada's inventory (report submission to the UN)." (Source)

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/06/09/983639/-Bonn-Day-4:-Fossil-Fool-CanadaWorst-Country-in-the-World