MEPs say EU must take lead on climate change

The world cannot afford to fail on agreeing a successor to the Kyoto Protocol by the end of 2009, senior MEPs have said ahead of their attendance at a major UN summit on climate change in Bali next week.

"In 2009 a new agreement must be ready for post-2012. We cannot delay for post 2012," said Alejo Vidal-Quadras, a Spanish centre-right MEP.

In March this year, the EU set a target to cut its carbon emissions by 20% by 2020 and has promised to move to 30% if other countries join in. Vidal-Quadras said he expected the EU to move up to 30% within the next two years.

But he added that the science on climate change had become more alarming. "One of the difficulties is that it is a process where humans don’t set the deadlines, the planet sets the deadlines…the scientific thinking was that we can double [emissions] to 550 ppm [parts per million], but now the message of science is that even 450ppm is too much", he said, referring to levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration in the atmosphere.

Vidal-Quadras will lead the Parliament’s 19-strong delegation to Bali. There MEPs will visit local environmental projects and attend meetings with parliamentarians and climate-change experts such as Nicholas Stern, the British economist who wrote an influential report on the costs of climate change published at the end of 2006. MEPs will also meet a delegation from the US Congress, led by John Kerry, the Democrat candidate in the 2004 American presidential race.

The MEPs hit back at criticism of the carbon emissions caused by delegates jetting off to the UN meeting. Satu Hassi, a Finnish Green MEP, said that the conference was "a cost effective and cost efficient way to meet each other".

The UN conference opened on Monday (3 December). Next week environment ministers from 180 countries, as well as delegations from the European Commission and the Parliament will be in attendance at the so-called ‘high-level segment’ on 12-14 December.

The world cannot afford to fail on agreeing a successor to the Kyoto Protocol by the end of 2009, senior MEPs have said ahead of their attendance at a major UN summit on climate change in Bali next week.