Annan praises Putin as Russia formally accedes to Kyoto Protocol

Canadian Press ^ | Nov 18, 2004

[Tailgunner Joe]

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) - Russia formally acceded Thursday to the Kyoto Protocol on global warming following its signing into law by President Vladimir Putin earlier this month.

Russia's permanent representative to the United Nations, Andrey Denisov, turned over the documents to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi - where the UN Security Council is holding a rare meeting.

"I congratulate President Putin and the Russian Federation for their leadership in making it possible for the protocol to enter into force - as it will, 90 days from tomorrow on Feb. 16, 2005," Annan said. "This is a historic step forward in the world's efforts to combat a truly global threat."

The protocol, ratified by both houses of Russia's Parliament last month, commits 55 industrialized countries to making significant cuts in emissions of gases like carbon dioxide by 2012.

The United States, the world's worst polluter, and Australia have rejected the pact.

Industrialized countries will have until 2012 to cut their collective emissions of six key greenhouse gases to 5.2 per cent below the 1990 level. Greenhouse gases are believed to trap heat in the atmosphere, warming the Earth.

[keysguy]

Will anyone ever verify what russia does and how much did

it cost coffee can to buy rasputin?

[Poohbah]

My guess: Russia will sell carbon credits for Euro-peon cash, then step out of the treaty. Kyoto wrecked, and the French get shafted with the bill, WOO-HOO!

[standupfortruth]

Can't figure Putin out. In the same week that he came out effectively for further cooperation on the war on terror and even suggested sending Russian troops to Iraq, he signs off on the biggest sham to ever hit the world in the guise of science. ??????????????

[gridlock]

Since Russia will have to do absolutely nothing to comply with Kyoto, I dont' see them as acceding to much of anything here.

As for calling the United States the "world's worst polluter", these guys really need to get a clue. The United States has by far the lowest level of pollution compared to unit of productive capacity of any nation on Earth. The statement the the United States is the "world's worst polluter" is the same as saying that the United States is head-and-sholders above any other nation in terms of productivity and economic activity.

Kyoto seeks to change all that by putting the brakes on US economic activity, as if the world will be better off if the US economy contracts by 10% or so.

Not gonna happen. The US will drop out of the UN before that will happen.

[Just mythoughts]

"The United States, the world's worst polluter, and Australia have rejected the pact."

We will avert this hoax for at least four more years. Bunch of dirt worshipers.

[EBH]

The truth about global warming - it's the Sun that's to blame
By Michael Leidig and Roya Nikkhah
(Filed: 18/07/2004)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/07/18/wsun18.xml

Global warming has finally been explained: the Earth is getting hotter because the Sun is burning more brightly than at any time during the past 1,000 years, according to new research.


A study by Swiss and German scientists suggests that increasing radiation from the sun is responsible for recent global climate changes.

Dr Sami Solanki, the director of the renowned Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Gottingen, Germany, who led the research, said: "The Sun has been at its strongest over the past 60 years and may now be affecting global temperatures.

"The Sun is in a changed state. It is brighter than it was a few hundred years ago and this brightening started relatively recently - in the last 100 to 150 years."

Dr Solanki said that the brighter Sun and higher levels of "greenhouse gases", such as carbon dioxide, both contributed to the change in the Earth's temperature but it was impossible to say which had the greater impact.

Average global temperatures have increased by about 0.2 deg Celsius over the past 20 years and are widely believed to be responsible for new extremes in weather patterns. After pressure from environmentalists, politicians agreed the Kyoto Protocol in 1997, promising to limit greenhouse gas emissions between 2008 and 2012. Britain ratified the protocol in 2002 and said it would cut emissions by 12.5 per cent from 1990 levels.

Globally, 1997, 1998 and 2002 were the hottest years since worldwide weather records were first collated in 1860.

Most scientists agree that greenhouse gases from fossil fuels have contributed to the warming of the planet in the past few decades but have questioned whether a brighter Sun is also responsible for rising temperatures.

To determine the Sun's role in global warming, Dr Solanki's research team measured magnetic zones on the Sun's surface known as sunspots, which are believed to intensify the Sun's energy output.

The team studied sunspot data going back several hundred years. They found that a dearth of sunspots signalled a cold period - which could last up to 50 years - but that over the past century their numbers had increased as the Earth's climate grew steadily warmer. The scientists also compared data from ice samples collected during an expedition to Greenland in 1991. The most recent samples contained the lowest recorded levels of beryllium 10 for more than 1,000 years. Beryllium 10 is a particle created by cosmic rays that decreases in the Earth's atmosphere as the magnetic energy from the Sun increases. Scientists can currently trace beryllium 10 levels back 1,150 years.

Dr Solanki does not know what is causing the Sun to burn brighter now or how long this cycle would last.

He says that the increased solar brightness over the past 20 years has not been enough to cause the observed climate changes but believes that the impact of more intense sunshine on the ozone layer and on cloud cover could be affecting the climate more than the sunlight itself.

Dr Bill Burrows, a climatologist and a member of the Royal Meteorological Society, welcomed Dr Solanki's research. "While the established view remains that the sun cannot be responsible for all the climate changes we have seen in the past 50 years or so, this study is certainly significant," he said.

"It shows that there is enough happening on the solar front to merit further research. Perhaps we are devoting too many resources to correcting human effects on the climate without being sure that we are the major contributor."

Dr David Viner, the senior research scientist at the University of East Anglia's climatic research unit, said the research showed that the sun did have an effect on global warming.

He added, however, that the study also showed that over the past 20 years the number of sunspots had remained roughly constant, while the Earth's temperature had continued to increase.

This suggested that over the past 20 years, human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation had begun to dominate "the natural factors involved in climate change", he said.

Dr Gareth Jones, a climate researcher at the Met Office, said that Dr Solanki's findings were inconclusive because the study had not incorporated other potential climate change factors.

"The Sun's radiance may well have an impact on climate change but it needs to be looked at in conjunction with other factors such as greenhouse gases, sulphate aerosols and volcano activity," he said. The research adds weight to the views of David Bellamy, the conservationist. "Global warming - at least the modern nightmare version - is a myth," he said. "I am sure of it and so are a growing number of scientists. But what is really worrying is that the world's politicians and policy-makers are not.

"Instead, they have an unshakeable faith in what has, unfortunately, become one of the central credos of the environmental movement: humans burn fossil fuels, which release increased levels of carbon dioxide - the principal so-called greenhouse gas - into the atmosphere, causing the atmosphere to heat up. They say this is global warming: I say this is poppycock."

[Colosis]

Lets see. If I pay more taxes, it won't rain as much - makes perfect sense. **for morons**

[yoe]

Kyoto Protocol? More Oil for Food games Mr. Putin?

Frankly I would be a little wary of any praise from Kofi.............

[Always Right]

The United States, the world's worst polluter, and Australia have rejected the pact.

CO2 is no more of a pollutant than Oxygen.

[Always Right]

If I understand correctly, Russia will make billions selling CO2 credits to many European countries. This has to be the stupiest treaties of all time.

[MWS]

Hey, if they want to kill their already weak economies, they can be our guests.

Somehow they'll find a way to blame us for their woes in the end. They always do.

[ZULU]

Is their new bomb environmentally safe????

[sgtbono2002]

Kofi needs to stop patting Putin on the back and come up with the figures on the oil for food scandal.

[Piquaboy]

Signing it and doing something about it are two different things. Putin is former KBG and is skilled at deception.

[longtermmemmory]

Kyoto passed its drop dead ratification date.

Russia signing this seems more like the "nuclear proliferation" treaties they signed and then ignored.

[Poohbah]

If I understand correctly, Russia will make billions selling CO2 credits to many European countries.

Uh-huh. The Euro-peons pay for Russian CO2 credits, Russia walks away from the treaty when the money expires, and Europe has to shut down a bunch of industry and go broke. The French get shafted, and that's a GOOD thing.

[Tailgunner Joe]

Kyoto Protocol to take effect from Feb 16

UN Secretary General Koffi Annan (L)
and Russian ambassador Andrey Desinov

18 November 2004 - The Bonn-based UNFCCC, the offshoot of the 1992 Rio Summit, is Kyoto's parent convention.

"A period of uncertainty has closed. Climate change is ready to take its place at the top of the global agenda," said Joke Waller-Hunter, executive secretary of the UNFCCC's secretariat.

Russia's move removed a years-long question mark over the future of the landmark agreement, which aims to curb carbon gas pollution blamed for disturbing the Earth's climate system.

Kyoto's framework was agreed in 1997 but it took four years to agree its complex rulebook.

US abandonment stripped Kyoto of the world's biggest producer of carbon gases and left the treaty on the brink of collapse.

Russia's ratification was necessary for Kyoto to survive.

Its ratification clauses require a minimum threshold of approval by polluting industrial signatories for it to be transformed from a draft agreement into a full-fledged treaty.