Guardian - Little Progress At Climate Summit (Not The Last Time You'll See This Headline)

[hatrack]

Environmental campaigners expressed anger last night after a UN climate change conference in Nairobi seemed to be about to end without major breakthroughs.

As talks continued, more than 180 countries had tentatively agreed to review the Kyoto protocol, which requires rich countries to limit greenhouse emissions, in 2008. But there was no deal on a deadline for setting new global targets that will apply after 2012, when Kyoto expires. Nor were there any signs that the US and Australia, which have rejected the treaty, would consider signing a successor agreement, or that industrialising countries such as China and India would agree to cut their carbon emissions in future.

The Kyoto review would show how much or how little progress has been made in tackling global warming. If the latter, the results could put pressure on rich nations to agree steeper cuts and on developing countries to limit emissions.

Barbara Helfferich, a European commission spokeswoman, said the timing of the review would ensure there was no gap between Kyoto and "son of Kyoto".

EDIT

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,1951073,00.html

[Warren Stupidity]

1. The window of opportunity is closing.

Within a few years, less than 10, the opportunity to alter course before we actually push the global climate into destabilizated behavior will have passed. At that point we will be fighting the effects of catastrophic climate change, and trying to reverse course on green house gasses, and dealing with the effects of peak oil political and economic destabilization. It will be the trifecta of system malfunctions. My guess is that we are too damn stupid to do anything before there is overt disaster. Oh well...