Obama’s recent pledge to “engage vigorously” with climate change issues has been welcomed by world leaders. It is his first major statement on the subject since he was elected president.
Yvo de Boer, who heads the UN’s Climate Change Secratariat, described the statement as “a huge signal of encouragement to the international community” and said that Obama “indicated that he intends to show national and international leadership”.
NEW ENERGY FOR AMERICA
In the Obama campaign climate change – a dirty word in the US – was dressed up as an issue of energy and security. Although there is not the drive to reduce emissions per se, Obama has promised some serious steps towards breaking America’s oil addiction.
His New Energy for America plan includes the following targets:
By 2012 – 10% of electricity from renewable sources
By 2015 – 1 million plug-in hybrid cars on the roads
By 2019 – 5 million new jobs and $150 million invested in new green energy economy
By 2050 – 80% reduction in gas emissions
TREADING A THIN LINE
Obama has staked too much of his reputation on the climate change issue to ignore is completely, but he still has a difficult task balancing it against issues like the credit crunch and the powerful oil and auto lobbies in the US.
He has not, for example, ruled out oil and gas exploration in the north of the US and Canada, nor off-shore drilling in the gulf of Mexico. This is part of an ambitious plan to cut oil dependency on Venezuala and the Middle East entirely by 2019 through a combination of exploration and stock-piling.
So far he’s making the right sounds, but green lobbyists will be scouring future statements carefully.
