Climate change is likely to dominate discussions at the three day summit of the Group of Eight (G8) leading industrial economies beginning on Wednesday in Heiligendamm, Germany.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, host of the meeting, wants G8 members to agree that global warming should be kept to a maximum of 2° C; to reduce their emissions by 50 per cent of their 1990 level by 2050; and to start work on a global emissions trading scheme.
But Ma Kai, Director of China’s National Development and Reform Commission, which determines climate change policy, has said that the EU proposal to limit warming to 2C has not been subjected to proper study.
“I fear this lacks a scientific basis,” he said of the EU’s proposed goal.
Meanwhile Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper will bring his own climate change plan to the G8 talks. “We have our own plan. We don’t have the German plan. We don’t have the American plan. We have a Canadian plan … with excellent ingredients to bring down greenhouse gas emissions,” said Sandra Buckler, Harper’s spokeswoman.
But in fact Canada does appear to support the American plan because the US President, George Bush, is calling for the world’s biggest emitters of greenhouse gases to settle within 18 months on nation-by-nation programs for slowing emissions.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD has worked in industry and government. She is currently researching a novel technique for long-range weather forecasting funded by the B. Macfie Family Foundation.