KyotoCLIMATE: With eye on Kyoto calendar, E.U. commissioner sizes up White House hopefuls (03/07/2008)
Darren Samuelsohn, Greenwire senior reporter
The European Union's top environmental official said today that he expects the next U.S. president to move quickly into action on negotiations over a new global warming treaty.
"We have a deadline by the end of 2009," Stavros Dimas, the E.U. environment commissioner, told reporters in Washington. "I strongly believe that we can achieve it, to have an agreement by then. That's plenty of time, even a whole year with a new administration. The issues are known. You have very well experienced people working on the issues for years."
Dimas' comments address a simmering debate among climate policymakers and observers over how much time will be needed to complete a climate agreement to replace the Kyoto Protocol whose second commitment period ends in January 2013.
Diplomats from more than 180 countries agreed in Bali, Indonesia, last December to a negotiation schedule that ends in 2009 in Copenhagen. But some predict that timeframe may not be adequate given how long it will take for the next U.S. president to get a staff in place.
"It's important to be both ambitious and realistic," said Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change and also a former top climate negotiator from the Clinton administration.
In an interview, Claussen recalled how she went to work for President Clinton just days after he took office in January 1993. "But when I wanted to convene talks on international policies, there was no one in the agency at a political level to do that with me," she said.
Claussen predicted the next administration will be slowed by a Senate confirmation process that won't get moving until the late spring or summer of 2009 -- perhaps even later.
"You can do some things with career civil servants who are there, but you don't have political leadership for months," Claussen said. "Even if you hit the ground running, it doesn't mean you can either have a clear policy accepted by all their political appointments or people to go handle negotiations at a senior level until close to midyear."
'Stock taking'
Dimas was in Washington for meetings with high-level Bush administration officials and members of Congress.
Also this week, some of Dimas' European Commission staff met with the Capitol Hill staff for two presidential candidates, New York Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain. A meeting with staff to Illinois Democratic Sen. Barack Obama was canceled.
"It's stock taking," said Artur Runge-Metzger, a top European Commission climate official.
The three remaining presidential candidates all support cap-and-trade legislation to limit U.S. greenhouse-gas emissions, which Dimas called the "big difference" between the Bush administration and the next president.
Dimas also welcomed Obama's recent comments that he would begin his work on crafting a new U.S. climate position if he secures the Democratic nomination for president.
"This is very encouraging," Dimas said. "I saw it in the newspapers."
In contrast to Obama, Clinton's campaign Web site signals she may want an extra year for the climate talks that stretch beyond the current U.N. timeframe.
"She would re-engage in negotiations, work to bring rapidly developing nations like China and India along, and convene high-level meetings every three months with the goal of getting a new deal in place by 2010, two years ahead of Kyoto's expiration," the Clinton campaign's environmental paper says.
A Clinton campaign official, Jin Chon, said Clinton supports the 2009 target for a new treaty. The statement means Clinton would support finishing the treaty by "the begining of 2010."
Neither McCain or Obama have given a specific date for when they would try to complete negotiations on a climate agreement. Calls to the McCain and Obama campaigns, as well as to their Senate staff offices, were not returned.
But in an interview last week, Obama adviser Dan Esty said his candidate would stand out from the others when it comes to international climate talks. "More than the alternatives, Barack Obama is likely to be given a fair bit of running room because of the freshness of perspective that he represents," he said.
Bush's role
Bush administration officials this week said they too were working with the presidential candidates, but only in their traditional roles as senators.
"We are not involved," Jim Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, said in an interview. "Here's the dilemma, all three candidates are sitting senators. To the extent they are related to policies, those members are [being briefed] in their role as senators."
Presidential campaign and Senate staff for the candidates are likely to continue playing a role in the climate negotiations over the coming months, including sending observer teams to the U.N. climate conference in Poland this December.
Claussen said the Bush administration remains relevant.
"It's an issue of how the Bush administration chooses to conduct itself between now and that meeting [in Poland] when it will still be in charge," she said. "It could be that the Bush administration is pretty forthcoming, understanding what is coming next and is helpful and it's easier."
Dimas planned to meet today with top U.S. climate officials, including Connaughton, Undersecretary of State Paulda Dobriansky and Dan Price, deputy national security adviser for international economic affairs. "There's remaining quite a lot to discuss between this year and next," Dimas said. "There's great importance to achieve with this administration as much as we can."
And ultimately, Dimas said delaying the international climate talks beyond 2009 is a decision that won't be made until Copenhagen. "If we do not achieve agreement, what can you do, you try again," he said. "But I don't like to think about it."