Repeat of Kyoto Protocol?

Today, as eco-activists from across the country will gather in New York to hear Obama's position on the climate summit, I remain hesitant. Already, people are growing less concerned with Obama's words, his ideas, and his lack of concise efforts. Now, with a globally influential event at hand, I wonder if Obama's warnings will come across as decisive, effective, and thorough. And with our nation being one of the top two emitters of greenhouse gases, Obama's actions must be definite.

It wasn't long ago, under the Bush administration, that the US made big mistakes after changing their stance on CO2 emission reductions:

The Kyoto Protocol was negotiated in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997. It was opened for signature on March 16, 1998, and closed a year later. Under terms of the agreement, the Kyoto Protocol would not take effect until 90 days after it was ratified by at least 55 countries involved in the UNFCCC. Another condition was that ratifying countries had to represent at least 55 percent of the world’s total carbon dioxide emissions for 1990. The first condition was met on May 23, 2002, when Iceland became the 55th country to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. When Russia ratified the agreement in November 2004, the second condition was satisfied, and the Kyoto Protocol entered into force on February 16, 2005. As a U.S. presidential candidate, George W. Bush promised to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. Shortly after he took office in 2001, however, President Bush withdrew U.S. support for the Kyoto Protocol and refused to submit it to Congress for ratification. Instead, Bush proposed a plan with incentives for U.S. businesses to voluntarily reduce greenhouse gas emissions 4.5 percent by 2010, which he claimed would equal taking 70 million cars off the road. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, however, the Bush plan actually would result in a 30 percent increase in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions over 1990 levels instead of the 7 percent reduction the treaty requires. That’s because the Bush plan measures the reduction against current emissions instead of the 1990 benchmark used by the Kyoto Protocol. While his decision dealt a serious blow to the possibility of U.S. participation in the Kyoto Protocol, Bush wasn’t alone in his opposition. Prior to negotiation of the Kyoto Protocol, the U.S. Senate passed a resolution saying the U.S. should not sign any protocol that failed to include binding targets and timetables for both developing and industrialized nations or that "would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States.

The plan is to replace the Kyoto treaty with a new one, to be agreed in Demark this December. However, prospects of a worthy deal is becoming less obvious everyday. And truly, it seems the biggest worries lay in China, whom are skeptical as to why they should contribute to a mess created by the wealthy--especially when it will put a damper on positive economic trends of their own country. As they watch our nation waver with half-made decisions, it is as if they are standing next us repeating the words "after you"--after all they are in no rush to push for reduction of emissions when statistics show that such efforts will not cause a decrease in emissions until at least 2030.

Even members of Obama's cabinet have recently spoken out against this issue, agreeing that decisions to be made in climate change may have to be put of until next year. And with our nation being one of the most critical facets to the Copenhagen Summit, it seems that this global effort will again be neglected.