Light my fire

Here's the US-European climate split in a nutshell.

The US perspective, from the US Representative to the European Union:

Boyden Gray told AFP that Washington and Brussels were "exchanging papers for the next EU-US summit and our differences are not that great."

"We were criticised for being much more interested in energy security than in climate change, but both sides of the Atlantic now agree it's the same and it's a constructive change... I don't see that much difference," he said in a phone interview.

Really? Not much difference.

Keep in mind that the EU just mandated 20% reductions in greenhouse gas emissions from 1990 levels by 2020. That's on top of Kyoto, which the US abandoned.

The EU view:

European Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas...tartly compared these [European] plans with the US voluntary approach.

"(The US) approach doesn't help in reaching international agreement and doesn't reduce (US) emissions, because they are right now 60 percent above the 1990 level," Dimas said, noting that in 2005, emissions by the 27-member EU were 7.4 percent below the 1990 benchmark.

It may not quite fit Robert Kagan's worldview, but I think we know which one is "awake and alert" and which one is sleeping.


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