I can paraphrase this article as follows
1) CO2 is not the real villain
2) it's all a plot by the Europeans
Re 1) if you want to find out how water vapour emissivity, cloud albedo and methane fit into the overall picture read the archives of realclimate.org. Scientists say it is the extra CO2 that has created more cloud (it didn't happen spontaneously) but the dimming effect has has peaked. CO2 is currently several times more problematical than methane and that is where the biggest cuts should be made.

Re 2) there might be a grain of truth in it but I think Europeans will have the last laugh when they have an easier time of it in years to come. My prediction is that the alternative climate deal will prove more ineffectual than Kyoto.

As I understand it, this latest agreement contains no mandatory targets. Where will this leave the agreement in realistic terms when countries put their national interest first? A reliance on good will alone?

I agree that technology plays an important role in reducing global warming, but wouldn't the money be better spent developing truly clean alternatives instead of band aid solutions which simply lessen the impact of greenhouse gas producing industries? What's more, these industries are unsustainable as they rely on finite resources. We're going to have to develop alternatives, and it would be better to start now than to wait until traditional resources are used up. As many critics point out, developing alternatives into viable replacements will take a long time, which is all the more reason to substantially increase funding, instead of the seemingly token funding these areas receive at the moment. Unfortunately, these funds are being diverted into temporary solutions instead.

There's no avoiding the need to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. The article criticised Kyoto for setting targets that are too low to have any measurable impact. True enough, they should be much higher. Will this latest agreement have a greater impact in reducing the effects of climate change? It's doubtful, given the writer's scepticism surrounding CO2 emmissions.

Alan,

Why did our Liberal Party have to come in on the grouter concerning global warming and gleefully knock out Kyoto. From a cockie who has learnt the hard way about the environment, finally giving credit to the honest hard-fighting greenies, it seems too much like dirty underhand wedge politics. Did Howard and Bush work this out while our honest little Johnny was over there in God's own Country?

George C, WA, (Bushbred)

We seem agreed that an effective plan for reducing global warming will have to be more ambitious than Kyoto and more binding than the alternative climate deal, and it is clear to me that the primary difficulty with this is the serious innovation required to make involvement in such a plan attractive to many many countries. The suggestion that the main impediment to the effectiveness of global politics is the placement of “national self-interest ahead of the international good” by European countries is –in the context of this article- a serious oversimplification. The pollies are doing the best they can for the world’s environment (albeit in a manner which is motivated by a desire to be PC) while sacrificing as little as possible of their country’s “interests”. That is, they’re putting national interest ahead of a sort of equality in the pursuit of international good, rather than putting it ahead of international good itself. This begs the question, of course, of whether international good necessarily includes the sort of equality in question but, regardless, if your role were Prime Minister to people who are represented by this ‘national interest’, wouldn’t you do the same? This articles says that you would with respect to John Howard, but fails to acknowledge the same with respect toEuropean leaders.

Just read in the Aussie reprint of the "Guardian" two interesting pieces regarding the Kyoto Incident.

1. Who would believe it, but China, who has just joined the ratpac mob to unearth Kyoto, says she would like the new group which includes Australia, to attempt to liase or join with Kyoto.

2. The Green Party has suggested that the new anti-Kyoto jag is really to do with a coal pact to find cleaner ways of burning coal, which includes four of the world's largest coal producers, including Australia. The Greens also suggested that both the US and Australia being on the outside of Kyoto, could be concerned that they might miss out on making a profit later on pro-Kyoto clean air technology.

Finally, china could be on the right track by suggesting that tow warring sides get together, but let's hope they earnestly talk about the perils of global warming rather than greedy wheeler dealing and trying to do each other down.

George C, WA - (Bushbred)

Finally, China could be on the right track by suggesting that both sides get together,

Kyoto would be a very different beast if China was inside the tent. However the original Kyoto deal allowed China to emmit CO2 without sanction. All Kyoto was going to do was to move industry from the west to the east at an even faster rate with little reduction in CO2 output.

If China now wants to be inside the tent then the USA and Australia deserve credit for holding out in favour of a realistic deal.

Any global deal on climate needs to include the developing world. Especially China and India

Mr Oxley, free trade warrior and global warming sceptic, will never lie down. He asserted (in the ABC Radio National Saturday Breakfast 9 April 2005) that a number of eminent and respectable scientists have expressed doubt about whether global warming is happening or not. This is the man that brought forth Michael Crichton’s discredited book “State of Fear” to support his argument when he last infested the pages of On Line Opinion. Who are these scientists?

Oxley attacks the Kyoto protocol and applauds the recently agreed “global policy” to which Australia and the USA have signed up, a policy which is merely voluntary and contains no specific targets. He also asserted, in the same program, “we don’t know enough about to start to take action which would cause standards of living to decline”. Many thousands of scientists must have been not taking their medication.

Interestingly, Mr Oxley said on the same program “One of the most important things to be done … is to get all the power stations in Asia, which is where the real growth is, China, India, Korea, to switch to more modern technologies which are more efficient burners of oil and gas, and which will bring the biggest drop in climate emissions that we could see.” So there is a problem and there is a way [amongst many] to address that problem.

We are being let down appallingly by apologists for energy generators and miners who oppose reductions in emissions. Just as we are by those who advance one solution like nuclear energy generation or clean coal, those who fail to carefully examine how many different strategies will in aggregate contribute to reductions. Less use of cars, hybrid cars, improved public transport, walking or bicycling more, energy conservation practices in buildings, giving out free energy saving light globes and on and on. Just as we are by those who assert that such practices and renewable energy development should not be supported by taxpayers yet ignore the costs of doing nothing and, equally important, that almost every aspect of society is subsidised in some way.

It is interesting that the countries which produce the most greenhouse gas per capita are the countries which are dragging their feet about doing something about reducing their output.
It would be great if John Howard and George Bush stayed at home a lot more and concentrated on governing the people who elected them.
The amount of greenhouse gases produced by these two flitting around the world all year round must be causing a lot of global warming as well as depleting the world fossil fuel supply.