Approximately 1,000 negotiators from 158 countries met Aug. 27-31 for a weeklong U.N. conference to establish guidelines for extending the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.
The concluding target strategies to combat global climate changes entailed industrialized countries striving to reduce emissions by 25 percent to 40 percent of their 1990 levels by the year 2020.
The European Union went a step further, by stating that it would tack another 10 percent reduction onto its pledge of 20 percent if the other industrialized nations would maintain their goals. These reductions are a more aggressive goal compared to the Kyoto pact's requirement, which required only a 5 percent reduction from the 1990 levels.
The United States is still not one of the current 35 industrial nations participating in the Kyoto accord and, along with China, is one of the largest contributors of carbon dioxide emissions.
The question is, "Why should the United States not want to ratify this protocol?'
From the time of the initial adoption of the 1997 protocol, the United States has claimed that the 2012 goals of the agreement unfairly exempt developing nation states and force the industrialized nations to bear the brunt of the stipulations.
It claims that it is at a great disadvantage because 1990, which was selected as the emission level standard, was the period when the United States was experiencing a huge economic boom.
At the same time, Europe was eliminating out-of-date technologies.
This has been the main argument presented by the Bush administration, which also cites the emission caps as being detrimental to the U.S. economy.
This is not a legitimate argument. We are a nation whose economy is rooted in the oil industry, a resource that is finite. Our gas-guzzling ways are not sustainable, as proven by peak oil.
The gall of the Bush administration to remove America - the once "indispensible nation" as dubbed by Madeleine Albright - from the negotiating tables because the agreements being etched out were not and are not cohesive to our prehistoric fossil fuel economy is quite childish.
This has shown our Achilles' heel and that we are dispensible because the United States no longer has political clout to counter the EU. The insistence of America in refusing to take up new sustainable technologies that support a new economic boom has proven to be detrimental to our economy.
The behavior of leaving the table because we are not getting our way 100 percent was made evident in Friday's session. It is no wonder the regulations within the Kyoto accord are not conducive to the needs of the United States.
To show that it is making an effort, over the past five years the Bush administration has allotted $29 billion toward climate and clean-energy technology research.
This is a shallow attempt that is similar to a clean room where everything has been shoved under the bed and in the closets. All we need to do is to examine the Bush administration's policy track record to realize that this should not be viewed as a valid attempt to control emissions.
In fact, this administration has worked hard to guard the archaic technologies that are the root of our leading carbon dioxide emissions through promotion of coal fired plants.
It has worked to repeal the regulations and laws of the 1963 Clean Air Act through the Clear Skies Initiative and it has whitewashed the hard science provided by the Union of Concerned Scientists and others.
We must not forget the bad investments in which time and money have been wasted in technologies that are too far into the future, such as the hydrogen fuel cell vehicle.
The administration continues to insist that it is "committed to collaborating with major economies" to reduce emissions, but it will not do anything until the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012.
The longer the United States waits to change to energy efficient and cleaner technologies, the more expensive and difficult the transition will be.
We are a nation that has prided itself in being the best in everything that we do. But we have become a nation that is unable to wean itself from non-renewable energies because the change and growth is viewed as being too painful and difficult.
We are exhibiting a very ignorant behavior by our refusal to be number one in environmental technologies. We currently consume 33 percent of the world's resources while accounting for only 4.6 percent of the world's population. This is the behavior of a selfish, irresponsible child.
America needs to reassume its leadership role by adopting the Kyoto Protocol, regaining environmental leadership and sustaining a new economic boom.
