BANGKOK, Thailand - The fate of a U.S. bill capping carbon emissions was expected to weigh heavily on delegates in UN climate talks that begin in the Thai capital on Monday, with the Americans saying delays on the domestic front could hamper their efforts to extract concessions from other nations.
Negotiations on a new UN climate pact have already been bogged down by a broad unwillingness to commit to firm emissions targets, and a refusal by developing countries to sign a deal until the West guarantees tens of billions of dollars in financial assistance -- something rich countries have so far refused to do.
"The more specific we can be, the easier it is to press others to be equally specific," Jonathan Pershing, the chief U.S. negotiator at the talks, told The Associated Press. "We have a lot of things we want from countries. We want significant action from other developed and developing countries. ... The less we can put on the table, the harder it is to achieve that outcome."
The UN climate talks -- held over two weeks in Bangkok -- are drawing some 1,500 delegates from 180 countries to try to reduce a 200-page draft agreement. They are also hoping to build on the goodwill shown at UN climate talks in New York last week, where world leaders expressed support for reaching a climate pact this year.
In June, the House of Representatives passed the first U.S. legislation to cap carbon emissions. The Senate, which is currently embroiled in the health care debate, is expected to take up the legislation as early as this week.
But Pershing said he doubted there's enough time to pass a climate bill in Congress before the year's biggest climate change negotiations in Copenhagen in December, which aims to reach a deal to replace the Kyoto Protocol expiring in 2012.
He said it wouldn't prevent a global deal as long as "we have clear movement, clear intent and a signal from the Senate that is it is moving" toward passage.""
Some environmentalists have said that passing the U.S. legislation is crucial to building momentum for a deal in Copenhagen. But UN climate chief Yvo de Boer agreed with Pershing that it wasn't essential, although he said it was important the Americans learned from the mistakes they made negotiating the 1997 Kyoto Protocol.
U.S. officials negotiated the Kyoto deal only to see Congress fail to pass it a few years later over concerns that it would hurt the American economy, and did not require China, India and other poorer countries to curb their emissions.
"It's not that you have to have legislation in place but you have to avoid another disconnect between the administration and people's representation," de Boer said Friday.
President Barack Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao -- whose countries are the world's two biggest emitters, each accounting for about 20 per cent of greenhouse gas pollution -- both vowed tough measures to combat climate change at the New York talks.
Hu said China would generate 15 per cent of its energy from renewable sources within a decade, and for the first time pledged to reduce the rate by which its carbon emissions rise. He did not give specific targets.
Japan's new prime minister, Yukio Hatoyama, whose nation generates more than 4 per cent of the world's greenhouse gases, also pledged to seek a 25 per cent cut in emissions from 1990 levels by 2020.
Most countries agree that temperature increases should be limited to 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels of about 150 years ago -- a level believed necessary to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. But so far, there is no consensus on how to reach that goal.
The world's average temperature already has risen 0.8 degrees Celsius since the 19th century.
Most industrialized nations have offered emissions cuts of 15 to 23 per cent below 1990 levels by 2020, falling short of the 25 to 40 per cent cuts scientists and activists say are needed to keep temperature increases below 2 degrees Celsius.
The United States has offered much lower targets so far, with the House bill proposing to reduce emissions by 17 per cent from 2005 levels -- that is about 4 per cent below 1990 levels -- by 2020.
There will be one more meeting in Spain in November before negotiators head to Copenhagen.
De Boer said that negotiations were far behind where they should be, but remained confident a deal would be reached in Copenhagen. Many experts, however, are less hopeful, and say it is unlikely a comprehensive treaty can be finalized this year.
"My expectations are very low," said David Victor, a professor at the University of California, San Diego, who has written extensively about climate negotiations since 1990.
"The world economic recession has made most governments acutely aware of policies that could affect economic growth," he said. "And the range of issues on the table in Copenhagen is so large and complex and the time available to sort them out is very short."
