Bush may sign G8 climate change agreement
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-07-04 09:24

Top officials are confident US President George W. Bush could pen an agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions at the G8 summit, newspapers said.

Leaders from the Group of Eight industrial powers are to start their three-day annual gathering on Wednesday at Gleneagles, Scotland. Host British Prime Minister Tony Blair has put climate change and Africa at the top of the agenda.

While the G8 has to tackle climate change, US President George W. Bush vowed to spurn any Kyoto-style deal on the 'significant' problem of global warming, he said in an interview to air Monday.[AFP/File]

In a draft text being thrashed out by negotiators on behalf of Britain, Germany, Canada, the United States, France, Italy, Japan and Russia, the G8 states are expected to pledge themselves to cut back on fossil fuel use, The Observer reported.

The burning of carbon-rich fuels releases the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide into the atmosphere which traps in the Sun's heat, thus warming the Earth's surface.

"With George Bush we are hoping he will sign up to a statement like 'climate change is a reality and we must look to find ways out of the problem by employing new technologies', a senior government source told The Sunday Times.

"We think Bush will basically swallow it out of his friendship with Tony Blair."

There were fears French President Jacques Chirac might scupper any agreement by insisting the Kyoto Protocol be the basis for any deal.

"It all depends on what mood Chirac is in on the day," the source told the newspaper.

An action plan will focus on providing green technology to developing countries and cleaning up air and land transport, The Observer reported.

"We were never going to get the Americans to accept everything on the science front or sign up to Kyoto; that was clear," a source told the newspaper.

"But what they do accept is that there is climate change and that for reasons of energy security and just reducing pollution, they favour measures that reduce our dependence on carbon-based fuels.

"The motivation might be different but the net results and the impact are the same."

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