CLIMATE CHANGE SUMMIT: HOT AIR IN KYOTO

Only a decade ago, the debate over global warming dealt mainly with whether it was a real problem or a Chicken Little scare story. In theory it made sense: we are burning more and more coal and oil; coal and oil generate carbon dioxide gas; carbon dioxide traps the sun’s heat like the glass of a greenhouse. In theory, therefore, the earth’s temperature should be on the rise–with potentially disastrous consequences that could include inundated coastlines, drastically altered weather, severe disturbances to agriculture, and tropical diseases’ pushing into new territory. But the effect was still too small to be measured with any confidence. Indeed, when James Hansen, of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Science, proclaimed in 1987 that “the warming has begun,” his colleagues, including many who took the threat seriously, declared his statement premature.

This week, as delegates from more than 170 nations meet in Kyoto, Japan, to try to hammer out a new global-warming treaty, it is clear that this cautious attitude has completely turned around. Melting glaciers, hotter summers and migrations of plants, animals and even deadly microbes have convinced virtually every climate scientist on earth that human activity has indeed started to warm the planet. Even business and labor leaders whose livelihood depends on the production and use of fossil fuels acknowledge the problem. “The science would indicate,” says United Mine Workers president Cecil Roberts, “that there is something happening here.” The CEO of American Electric Power, quoted in the current issue of FORTUNE, agrees. “It’s clear to me that there is an increase of CO2, that it’s probably not for the good, and we ought to do something about it.”

But taking global warming seriously and doing something about it are two very different propositions. The nations gathered in Kyoto are split into several factions, each pushing a different plan to deal with impending climate change, and each–despite a spate of preconference workshops held during the past few months in an effort to narrow the differences–sticking to its guns. “I’m confident that some kind of agreement will be worked out in Kyoto,” says Toshiaki Tanabe, Japan’s ambassador for global environmental affairs. But there is every likelihood, in fact, that the U.N.-sponsored conference will accomplish nothing substantive.

The reason for disagreement is based almost entirely, and naturally enough, on self-interest. The European Union, for example, wants to see industrial nations–its own members included–bring emissions of CO2 and other heat-trapping gases down to 85% of what they were in 1990, and do it within the next 12 years.

It is an ambitious goal but easier for the Europeans to meet than for anyone else. That is because they already have–through various accidents of history and politics–a big head start. The collapse of East Germany in 1990 forced many inefficient, pollution-belching factories and power plants out of business, cutting Europe’s emissions as a side benefit. Similarly, when Margaret Thatcher broke the British coal miners’ unions in 1985, Britain was able to switch to cleaner-burning natural gas. France, for its part, never had much coal and is heavily reliant on nuclear power today. With relatively powerful Green parties and citizenries that tend to care about these things, the E.U. is almost required to take a strong pro-environment line in Kyoto.

Things are a lot tougher for the U.S. Thanks largely to the current economic boom, America’s emissions have been growing while Europe’s have declined. The only way to reverse that trend is to slash oil and coal use by upgrading the efficiency of cars, factories and power plants. But such conversions could be extremely expensive and would throw thousands of energy workers out of their jobs.

The President has no interest in political suicide; neither does the Vice President, who, despite his concern about the environment, is not expected to attend the conference. They have sent delegates to Kyoto armed with a proposal that is much weaker than the E.U.’s. It would push emissions down to 1990 levels, and no lower, some time between 2008 and 2012. Part of that reduction would come through an international system of emissions trading, by which, say, a power company based in the U.S. could upgrade a plant in China and use reduced emissions there to meet its domestic target.

But the U.S. plan has already been denounced by the Europeans. Moreover, the President has been saddled with a Senate restriction that has made his position even less tenable. Previous agreements on greenhouse-gas emissions, as well as the proposal the E.U. is bringing to Kyoto, have tried to ease the burden on such developing countries as China and India. Most of the world’s emissions come from the U.S. and Europe, after all, and richer countries can more easily afford to clean up.

The Senate disagreed. Swayed by economic arguments, and also by the fact that emission levels in developing nations are rising rapidly, it declared unanimously in August that it would never ratify a treaty that let developing countries avoid some sacrifices. At a pre-Kyoto workshop in Bonn in October, the so-called G77 group–77 developing nations–along with China, thumbed its collective nose at the U.S. by signing on to the European plan.

Several other countries and alliances are bringing their own proposals to Kyoto. Whether so many contentious factions can agree on anything at all is uncertain. Even if by some chance all 170 countries endorsed the toughest proposal on the table, global warming would only be slowed. “If we stopped emitting greenhouse gases today,” says Clinton’s science adviser, John Gibbons, “temperatures would rise another several degrees.”

Conversely, even if the relatively weak U.S. plan goes through, it will be extremely difficult for Americans to abide by it. “If we do this properly,” said the President when he announced his proposal in October, “we will not jeopardize our prosperity; we will increase it.”

Someday, perhaps. But first we will have to invest heavily in new, energy-saving technologies. It may make economic sense to pay more for a new car, furnace or solar panel that will save money and energy in the long run, but it is hard–for both individuals and companies–to sacrifice current profit for future gain.

Part of Clinton’s plan calls for the U.S. government to invest in such technologies as solar cells to drive the cost of production down, and to offer tax breaks to companies that do the same. But such measures would have to get past a hostile Congress. Americans proved during the oil-price shocks of the 1970s that they can get interested in energy efficiency when prices shoot up; if anything can curb greenhouse-gas emissions, it is the free market. Unfortunately, the price of oil in constant dollars is close to what it was in the car-happy 1950s, and prices are likely to keep falling.

For all these reasons, it may be inevitable that our children will grow up in a significantly warmer world, one whose climate will change in unpredictable ways. Yet for all the factors working against any sort of agreement in Kyoto, the last hope of controlling that change may depend on what happens there this week. Even the feeblest of agreements is better than none, says M.I.T. atmospheric chemist Michael Molina, who shared a 1995 Nobel Prize for helping unravel the tangentially related problem of ozone depletion. “The larger issue is to make sure the process begins,” he says. “We’d better get started.”

–Reported by Irene M. Kunii/Tokyo and Dick Thompson/Washington