United States and Australia Dodge Kyoto Bullet

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<?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = “urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags” />Washington, D.C., February 14, 2004—The Competitive Enterprise Institute congratulates the United States and Australia for their leadership in refusing to ratify the fatally flawed and potentially disastrous Kyoto Protocol climate treaty, which is scheduled to enter into force internationally on Wednesday.

 

The United Nations’ Kyoto Protocol will require 35 industrialized nations to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by an average of 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2008 to 2012.  Full compliance will have no measurable effect on future temperatures according to scientists who nonetheless support the treaty. 

 

“The Kyoto Protocol has been sold as a first step in addressing climate change, but it is a step in the wrong direction.  The costs of the policies required by Kyoto will far outweigh any potential benefits,” said Director of Global Warming and International Environmental Policy Myron Ebell. “President Bush and Prime Minister Howard are to be congratulated for leading the way to a brighter future based on technological innovation.”

 

“In the European Union, Japan, and Canada, the reality that Kyoto is a dead end and cannot possibly work is already beginning to set in.  We can only hope that they will be able to jump off the Kyoto bandwagon before too much economic damage has been done,” Ebell continued.  “Because they have refused to sign on to the energy rationing required by Kyoto, Americans and Australians will be wealthier, healthier, and therefore better able to deal with future environmental challenges, whatever their cause.”

 

“India, China, and other major developing nations have come to agree with the Bush Administration that even if global warming does turn out to be a problem, then the only workable solution will be long-term technological transformation of the global energy sector.  Now we need to work on expanding that consensus to include the EU and Japan,” Ebell concluded.