Green Times

The upcoming Group of Eight summit in Japan will not set medium-term targets for global cuts in carbon emissions but should help push forward UN-led climate negotiations, Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda said Tuesday.The United States has opposed setting targets at the July 7-9 summit of rich countries, saying that action on global warming should also […]

The G8 must send a strong message on global warming to get big emerging economies on board, Denmark’s climate minister said on Monday, amid fresh signs that Washington is hampering efforts to make climate change a summit centrepiece.Next month’s G8 summit in Hokkaido, northern Japan, is expected to formalise a goal agreed last year that […]

Food supply and environmental issues will dominate next month’s summit of the Group of Eight major industrial nations in Japan, Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda said on Monday.”Water and food issues are critical not only to health, but also to socio-economic development,” said Fukuda in a video message at the World Economic Forum on East Asia […]

A discussion of the effects of climate change on Africa, excerpted from “Africa’s Development: Promises and Prospects - Report of the Africa Progress Panel 2008.”Global warming is well underway, and its consequences are already visible in Africa. Severe drought lurks behind the Darfur conflict, for example, and it is very likely that the problem […]

Greenpeace says green renewable energy can be cheaper, cleaner, and create more jobs than fossil fuels.The organisation also says that if the alternative energy is embraced now, it could see the phasing out of coal use by 2030.
In a new report titled Australia’s Energy Revolution, the group says the right recipe would deliver 40 per […]

There has been a frenzy of populist political arguments over petrol and whether a carbon price should be imposed on the hurting Australian motorist.Some politicians seem to think the high global oil price is already doing the job on greenhouse gas emissions by encouraging more efficient use of fuel.
Oil prices have indeed doubled in a […]

India may have won the first round at Bali in December 2007 but the UN meeting on climate change at Bonn from June 2-13 saw the developed countries try to alter the Bali agenda.India, along with the G-77 grouping, had to fight hard in the subsidiary meeting to defend the Bali roadmap.
There was an attempt […]

There is plenty of partisan fodder on the White House campaign trail but also evidence of common ground between Barack Obama and John McCain that would take the United States in a new direction.Whoever wins the November election, the world’s most powerful economy is likely to join global efforts against climate change. Guantanamo Bay would […]

A global agreement on fighting climate change can be reached next year, the EU’s Environment Commissioner has claimed.Stavros Dimas said there were important signals from countries around the world pointing to a deal being struck when world leaders gather for the UN climate conference in Copenhagen.
“Japan has agreed to work towards 60 per cent to […]

The US and China will announce an agreement on energy and the environment at their Strategic Economic Dialogue (SED) meeting next week, a senior Treasury official said today.Ambassador Alan Holmer, the Treasury’s special envoy for China, told reporters the agreement would cover clean air, clean water, clean and efficient production and transmission of electricity, and […]