Progress on a "green fund"

One "climate change" solution is the creation of a "green fund". There is some progress and this should be seen as low hanging fruit.

The following quote sums up my view on this issue.

Connie Hedegaard, the European Union's climate commissioner, said that there was "some convergence" on the Green Fund but little sign of movement on underlying issues from China and the United States, the top greenhouse gas emitters.

Progress Seen On "Green Fund" For Climate Deal

Almost 50 nations made progress on Friday toward a "Green Fund" to help poor countries fight global warming but hosts Mexico and Switzerland said a full U.N. climate treaty was out of reach for 2010.

Environment ministers and senior officials meeting in Geneva also examined how to raise a promised $100 billion a year in climate aid from 2020 -- perhaps from carbon markets, higher plane fares or taxes on shipping -- to be managed by the Fund.

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Mexico will host an annual U.N. climate meeting in Cancun from November 29-December 10. A Green Fund is meant to help poor nations shift from fossil fuels and cope with projected floods, droughts, mudslides and rising seas caused by climate change.

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"We created a lot of expectations in Copenhagen that we would get a comprehensive, legally binding solution. We are no longer fixated on that," Swiss Environment Minister Moritz Leuenberger told a news conference with co-host Espinosa.

FORESTS, CLEAN TECH

Espinosa said a Green Fund would only be agreed as part of a broad package in Cancun, including ways to share clean-energy technologies or protect carbon-absorbing forests. She said all elements of the package had to be agreed, or none.

U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern told a news conference that the meeting had been "pretty constructive."

"The biggest issue is...this has to be part of a package. We are not going to move on the Green Fund, and the $100 billion, if issues central to the Copenhagen Accord, including mitigation and transparency, don't also move," he said.

Stern also reiterated that President Barack Obama was committed to cutting U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 even though the Senate has failed to pass legislation. The United States is the only major developed nation with no legal cap.

Connie Hedegaard, the European Union's climate commissioner, said that there was "some convergence" on the Green Fund but little sign of movement on underlying issues from China and the United States, the top greenhouse gas emitters.

"We've seen nothing new coming out of the U.S., nothing new coming out of China. So we have to be very practical," she said of a focus on steps that fall short of a treaty.

Earlier, the Netherlands launched a U.N.-backed website (www.faststartfinance.org) to try to track how far rich nations, struggling with austerity, are able to keep a pledge made in Copenhagen to give poor nations $30 billion in "new and additional" climate aid from 2010-12.

Christiana Figueres, the U.N.'s climate chief, said the cash was a "golden key" to convince poor nations that the rich were serious in taking the lead to curb global warming. Under the Copenhagen Accord, flows would surge to $100 billion a year from 2020.

So far, the website lists cash promises by 6 European donors including Germany and Britain and 27 recipients from Bangladesh to the Marshall Islands. Stern said Washington would submit U.S. data in coming weeks.

Many of the developing nations' sites, listing cash received, are blank.

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