Business & Politics (news)

Immediately following release of the “CCPI” report , the worst nations for C02 emissions (see graphic table) issued defensive sounding statements to the press. For example, according to Associated Press, “China defended its climate protection efforts Tuesday after being ranked near the bottom of a report on countries fighting climate change. "The Chinese government attaches great importance to this issue and we have acceded to the Climatic Change Framework Agreement and the Kyoto Protocol," Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Jiang Yu said at a regular briefing.”” We heard similar puffery from the US spokes-person. And, is it just us or do the UK and a few other rankings seem out of whack? Certainly counter-intuitive. What we want is clarity for responsibility, stretch improvement goals, and performance against clear, sensible metrics. Let us know if you can come up with a scenario that would bring these about.
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Via IOL:- Under Secretary of State Paula Dobriansky rejected UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's charge that there was a "frightening lack of leadership" at climate talks in Nairobi, saying "We think that the United States has been leading in terms of its ground-breaking initiatives."

Via PlanetArk:- US mayors who fight global warming at city hall, on city streets and at the city dump swapped strategies this week at a snowed-in summit in Utah, and some hoped the federal government would follow their lead.