Bush administration officials have complained that the treaty is bad for American businesses, lets developing countries off the hook, and hardly makes a dent in global emissions. Indeed, according to UN estimates, the Kyoto treaty, if fully implemented, would reduce the projected temperature rise of 1.4 to 5.8 degrees Celsius by only 0.1 degree over the next century.

"Kyoto is without doubt only the first step," says Klaus Toepfer of the UN Environment Programme, which oversees implementation of the treaty. "We will have to do more to fight this rapid increase in temperature on our wonderful blue planet Earth. It will be hard work."

Meanwhile, scientific evidence continues to mount in support of strong action to combat global warming through emissions reductions. At an international conference in England last week, scientists reported that melting glaciers, shrinking Arctic ice sheets, and global changes in rainfall patterns are all attributable to global warming, and the effects are likely to grow worse quickly.

Although more renewable energy is now coming onstrea?, 85 percent of the world?s energy needs are still derived from climate-changing fossil fuels and we?re a long way off from kicking the carbon habit.
According to Einar Haandlkken from the Oslo-based environmental group Zero, time is something that we just don?t have. ?Reducing the world?s dependency on fossil fuels will take too long,? says Haandlkken. ?We don?t have enough time to do this because we need to cut greenhouse gases immediately.?
Zero is now working with Norway?s oil and power industry to remove millions of tons of CO2 from Norway?s fossil-fuelled power plants and pipe them deep under the North Sea into old and existing oil fields.
Many environmentalists, though, completely reject the technology. ?We are totally opposed to carbon sequestration as a means of dealing with climate change,? says Anita Goldsmith, climate campaigner with Greenpeace UK. ?There is no safe way to store and capture CO2, and the technology has not yet been proven.?
Despite these fears, for an increasing number of oil companies carbon sequestration is now a reality. Since 1996, Norway?s Statoil has been using it to remove millions of tons of CO2 from its North Sea Sleipner gas field and entomb it in a saline aquifer six tenths of a mile beneath the chilly waters of the North Sea.
Trude Sundset, chief corporate researcher at Statoil, has no doubts about both the safety and viability of the technology. ?Our research has shown that CO2 storage under the North Sea will be safely locked away until at least the next Ice Age.? And early this year both Statoil and the British oil giant BP were involved in a joint project to pump millions of tons of CO2 three miles underground from a gas field in Algeria.
Speaking from Great Britain, Simon Shackley of the Tyndall Center for Climate Change Research agrees with Zero that carbon sequestration has a valid role to play. ?Certainly the technology works and it could take vast amounts of CO2 out of the atmosphere as practically renewables can?t take the place of fossil fuels overnight,? he says. ?Carbon sequestration needs to be looked at carefully as part of a portfolio of solutions to global warming along with renewable energy and energy efficiency.?

by Simon Birch

WASHINGTON, January 27, 2005- The World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors today approved a US$1 billion adaptable program loan (APL) facility to support the Energy Community of South East Europe program (ECSEE) – a program aimed at integrating energy systems in South East European countries into the internal energy market of the European Union. The ECSEE APL program will help the countries in the region develop the energy community by implementing priority investments supporting electricity market and power system operations, technical assistance for system development, and project preparation and implementation.

"The Energy Community is a great opportunity for the countries of South East Europe to work together in order to provide a stable and continuous energy supply and to improve the security of energy supply.
The creation of an area without internal frontiers for energy will contribute to economic development and social progress in the region," said Task Team Leader Mr. Kari Nyman.

The ECSEE is being developed following the Athens Memorandum on the on the regional energy market process, signed in Athens, Greece on December 8, 2003. An international Treaty has been substantially negotiated and is expected to be signed in mid-June 2005. A comprehensive implementation organization has been established and is working to implement the Athens Memorandum and the forthcoming Treaty.

World Bank financing will be provided using the adaptable program lending (APL) instrument, which is designed to help ensure the availability of adequate resources to fund priority investments for a functioning electricity market. The APL instrument enables the Bank to provide support in a flexible manner – when individual countries have met the policy triggers (country criteria under the Athens Memorandum and the ECSEE Treaty) and when individual projects are ready to receive Bank support. The ECSEE APL is directly linked to the Athens
energy market process and the ECSEE Treaty – as long as countries meet their obligations in the Athens process and the ECSEE Treaty, they are eligible to receive support from the ECSEE APL facility.

Other financial institutions and bilateral donors supporting the Energy Community include the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the European Investment Bank (EIB), the German Development Bank (KfW), the United States Agency for International
Development (USAID), the Canadian Agency for International Development (CIDA), and the governments of France, Greece, Italy, and Switzerland.

The first constituent loan under the ECSEE APL facility, approved today by the World Bank, is a EUR66 million (US$84.3 million equivalent) loan to the Romanian hydropower generator Hidroelectrica S.A., with the guarantee of the Romanian Government. The loan will help finance the rehabilitation of Hidroelectrica’s Lotru Hydropower Station and technical assistance for its institutional development and project implementation. The rehabilitation of t?e Lotru hydropower station will ensure reliable services to the national power grid for another 20 years maintaining the power supply at the current necessary level of 510 megawatts. The fixed-spread Euro 66 million loan will be at the standard variable interest rates for LIBOR-based Euro-denominated single currency loans, payable in 17 years, including 5 years of grace. According to Mr. Nyman, "in view of Romania’s progress with its energy sector reforms and its active participation and important role in the Energy Community’s development, it is appropriate for Romania to be the first beneficiary of the ECSEE APL facility."

For more information about the Energy Community of South East Europe, please visit:
[url=http://www.seerecon.org/infrastructure/sectors/energy/index.html]http://www.seerecon.org/infrastructure/sectors/energy/index.html[/url]

For more information on the World Bank’s work in Romania, please visit: [url=http://www.worldbank.org.ro]http://www.worldbank.org.ro[/url]

Ottawa says that by 2010 it wants car makers to cut emissions by 25 percent from 1995 levels. But major automobile manufacturers say it would be hard to introduce new technologies at such short notice to meet Ottawa’s demands and the two sides have yet to reach a deal.

Environment Minister Stephane Dion threatened on Thursday to impose binding restrictions, saying the talks had gone on long enough.

"This (imposing restrictions) is something we want to avoid in Canada because we want an agreement with the car makers. But at the same time, if unfortunately we don’t get an agreement, we’ll have to act," he told Reuters in an interview.

"We’ve been discussing things for a long time and now it’s enough. I hope we’ll come to an agreement very soon because we can’t carry on for months with this lack of certainty which is good for neither the economy or the environment."

Cutting emissions from cars is one way Canada hopes to meet its targets under the Kyoto protocol on climate change, which obliges Ottawa to cut output of greenhouse gases by six percent from 1990 levels by 2012.

Canadian emissions are in fact about 20 percent above 1990 levels and senior government officials candidly admit the country has no chance of meeting its Kyoto goals.

One of the reasons Canada is struggling is that the climate change file is shared between the environment ministry and the ministry of natural resources, which is responsible for the well-being of Canada’s booming energy sector.

Natural Resources Minister John Efford, who along with Dion is talking to the car makers, was noticeably less enthusiastic about the idea of binding regulations on the major car makers.

"I want to give them a chance … I feel confident that they will come back with some good recommendations," he told Reuters in a separate interview.

"If not, then we have to take some alternative measures. But I am working with the automobile industry on a voluntary protocol and I want to continue on with that," he said.

Efford said he and Dion had "a very frank discussion" with the car makers in December about the need to meet the 25 percent emissions cut target. He said new talks were planned for the near future but did not na?e a specific date.

Last week Dion visited California, which has told car makers to cut emissions by 30 percent by 2016.

"The Californians showed us that … the technologies are in place and this could be done easily. The higher (purchase) price people would pay would very rapidly be made up by the savings at the pump," he said.

France’s Court of Accounts, which oversees the finances of public bodies and state-owned enterprises, said in a controversial report published on Wednesday that debt- laden EDF had only what it termed an "embryo" of the money needed to keep nuclear sites safe once they are taken out of service in future decades.

EDF is the world’s single largest producer of nuclear energy, which provides the bulk of France’s electricity supplies, and is due for partial privatisation this year.

It has spent heav?ly on a series of acquisitions abroad in recent years, eating up finances that are also heavily strained by future obligations of a generous staff pension scheme.

The Court of Accounts said EDF’s preparations for nuclear decommissioning were marked by a lack of clearly formalised rules and raised concerns that the cost of safeguarding nuclear installations would fall on future consumers or the state.

It also criticised what it called a lack of transparency in EDF’s financial accounting.

EDF declined to comment on the report other than to say it had been setting aside cash to help pay for costs to clean up nuclear waste.

"EDF has always integrated in the kilowatt-per-hour price the financial effort needed for long-term management of waste and for the dismantling of power stations," a spokesman for EDF said.

"Provisions amount to nearly 25 billion euros ($32.5 billion), besides 2.3 billion euros have already been set aside for funds that cover future nuclear waste costs," he added.

The long-term management of nuclear waste will be treated by EDF Chairman Pierre Gadonneix on Feb. 3 at a parliamentary hearing to evaluate scientific and technological issues, he said.

"We need to do something that even dwarfs the Manhattan project," Frist told the World Economic Forum in Davos. The Manhattan project was the codename for the United States’s World War Two effort to devise an atomic weapon.

"The greatest existential threat we have in the world today is biological. Why? Because unlike any other threat it has the power of panic and paralysis to be global."

He predicted that the world would experience another bioweapon attack within the next decade, following the limited casualties seen when anthrax was sent through the US mail system in 2001.

Next time, the death rate could be a much, much higher, said Massachusetts Insitute of Technology Professor John Deutch.

An attack using the smallpox virus is overwhelmingly the largest risk, he believes.

The disease was officially eradicated three decades ago but Deutch said it was possible former Soviet stocks were still at large or even that small quantities could be extracted from graves.

"Every country has a vulnerability here," he said.

VACCINE

In a bid to protect citizens, the US government has ordered millions of doses of smallpox vaccine as part of a wide- ranging security drive in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

Other governments are also following suit in stocking up on smallpox shots.

But experts warned that other avenues were open to would- be terrorists, with diseases such as plague and Ebola haemorrhagic fever virus options for weaponisation.

More worryingly still, sophisticated groups might in the future use genetic engineering to produce hybrid microbes against which there are no defences.

Francis Collins, director of the US National Human Genome Research Institute, said such developments raised the question of whether there should be restrictions on publication of some scientific research in biology.

Physicists are already limited from sharing information on atomic weapons technology.

Collins said openness was the best strategy but he suggested there could be specific information about protocols used to create dangerous super-bugs that might, in future, be classified.

Researchers at the CEA research centre in France have estimated that a person would have to eat 5 grams (0.2 ounce) of tainted tissue from an animal showing clear signs of the disease to be at risk of developing Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD).

"It is almost impossible now with the measures that have been taken to reach these doses," Dr Jean-Philippe Deslys told Reuters.

Since 1989 the brain and spinal cord of the central nervous system of cattle have been banned for human consumption. Animals are also tested for signs of mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).

"The combination of the two measures is very efficient," said Deslys.

If an infected animal that was just below the test limit was shown to be negative for BSE, 1.5 kilograms (3.3 lb) of its infected tissue would have to be consumed to pose a health risk, according to the research.

The scientists, whose findings are reported online by The Lancet medical journal, estimated the amount of infected tissue people would have to eat by giving adult primates 5 grams of ground brain tissue from a BSE infected cow.

One animal developed a disease similar to vCJD five years after it was infected but the other animal remained healthy.

Using their results and the findings from other studies they calculated the amount of exposure to BSE that would be dangerous to humans.

"Our results provide reassurance that BSE screening procedures combined with central nervous system removal are effective measures to protect the human food chain," Deslys said in the study.

But vCJD experts said there were fundamental problems comparing likely human exposure based on primate studies.

"Multiple oral exposure events over a period of years seems likely in the UK, and vCJD occurs predominantly in young adults, raising the possibilities of age-related susceptibility or exposure," Professor James Ironside, of the University of Edinburgh, said in a commentary on the research.

Because of the long incubation period, which Deslys and his colleagues estimate could be up to 50 years, it has been difficult to pred?ct how many cases of vCJD there will be.

Up to Nov. 1 last year, 146 people had died from definitive or probable vCJD in Britain, according to the Department of Health.

The grant is funded through the Poverty Reduction Cooperation Fund and financed by the Government of the UK.

"The potential for solar energy development is huge, not only generating electricity but also for water pumping for water supply and small scale irrigation, provision of potable water, hot water for homes, hospitals, and other buildings," said Ali Azimi, an ADB Senior Environment Specialist and mission leader for the project.

More than 80 percent of the population lives in rural areas and depends on traditional fuels for cooking and water heating, and kerosene for lighting. This is having an adverse impact on forests and watersheds. Most of Afghanistan’s 25 million people have no access to modern forms of energy, such as electricity, gas, and liquid fuels.

The grant should demonstrate how solar energy could be used to enhance the quality of life for low-income communities living in remote villages with limited to no prospects for grid electricity. It would also show how a community-based approach could lead to the success of such programs.

Estimates indicate that solar radiation in Afghanistan averages about 6.5 kilowatt- hours per square meter per day. Lighting provided by solar energy could be used in the running of literacy and other courses in the evenings that would benefit children and adults who work in the fields during the day. Solar-powered pumps would provide irrigation for agricultural production, which is the livelihood of 85 percent of the people in the country. This is important both for increasing incomes and for enhancing food security for vulnerable families.

"Rural electrification is the only way that most of the populace can move toward attaining energy security and enhancing social welfare," Azimi said. "The remoteness of rural locations and the topography of the country would make the expansion of elect?icity supply in remote areas through a centralized grid system difficult, and may not be economically feasible. The long-term objective of the TA (technology assistance grant), therefore, is to lay the foundations for sustainable dissemination and use of solar systems in these areas."

The grant should provide solar photovoltaic systems at household level in 10 communities on a pilot basis and train 10 persons from different ethnic groups as solar technicians at a community based training center in India. Upon return they will train 10 additional persons from their communities in installing and maintaining solar systems as energy entrepreneurs.

Specifically targeted are the poor, illiterate, and vulnerable and the primary beneficiaries will be those with no formal education, especially disabled people, youth, and women. In particular, disabled people who were maimed in years of conflict could be associated with the initiative by including them among these "barefoot" technicians.

Such marginalized people would be trained to design, install, and service these systems while capacity would be developed in the public sector to promote, monitor, and evaluate system performance. The technology assistance grant will also provide the policy framework for expanded use of solar photovoltaic systems.

The Ministry of Water and Power is the executing agency for the grant, which is due for completion in December 2006. The Afghan Government is contributing $150,000 equivalent toward the total project cost of $900,000.

With consumer natural gas prices more than doubling in the past four years, 650 New Mexicans have joined 50,000 other Americans in pressing Senator Pete Domenici (R-N.M) to reduce gas prices by increasing development of renewable energy sources like wind and solar power.

Senator Domenici, Chair of the Senate Energy Committee, held a hearing on the issue this week. Earlier versions of the senator’s energy bill focused on increasing drilling in sensitive areas and expanding subsidies for polluting fossil fuels while giving short shrift to clean energy solutions like the renewable electricity standard.

"Extracting enough natural gas to supply the U.S. for less than a day does not justify the destruction of hunting and fishing paradises like the Valle Vidal," said Ellery Worthen, lifelong hunter and secretary of the New Mexico Wildlife Federation. "I hope that Senator Domenici will support the average New Mexico citizen by supporting clean energy alternatives."

The analysis found that a national renewable electricity standard of 20 percent by 2020 would produce benefits for New Mexico such as:

- 4,760 new high-skilled jobs in manufacturing, construction, operation, maintenance, and other industries-2.7 times more jobs than new natural gas and coal power plants would create
- $1.6 billion in capital investment
- $117 million in property tax re?enues for rural communities
- $57 million in payments to ranchers and rural landowners from wind power leases and the production of biomass energy

A 10 percent standard similar to the one twice-passed by the U.S. Senate would yield more moderate benefits, including $250 million in consumer savings, 790 new jobs, $948 million in capital investment, and $69 million in new property tax revenues for rural communities.

"New Mexico can reduce natural gas prices, save consumers money, create jobs, and boost rural economic development by tapping into its strong renewable energy potential," said Kate Abend, Energy Field Coordinator for the Union of Concerned Scientists. "New Mexico has the technical potential to meet nearly 22 times its electricity needs with renewable energy."

In addition to benefiting New Mexico, the study found that nationally, a 20 percent standard would create 355,000 new jobs, save consumers $49 billion on their energy bills, add $10 billion to the country’s gross domestic product, and provide $16 billion in payments to farmers, ranchers, and rural landowners. The electricity standard would also reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 15 percent below the business-as-usual case. The same policy would cut smog, soot, and mercury emissions from fossil fuel power plants and reduce harmful water and land impacts of extracting, transporting, and using fossil fuels.

Total new additions were down sharply from the highs in the boom years of 2001, 1,696 MW, and 2003, 1,687 MW. But at year’s end, the trade group said, utility-scale wind installations in 30 states across the country totaled 6,740 MW, enough to serve more than 1.6 million households.

The small but burgeoning industry is hard at work planning projects that should make 2005 a record year in terms of new wind generating capability in the U.S. According to AWEA, over 2,000 MW of new wind power capacity is likely to be added during the coming year, or enough to power more than 540,000 homes. The most recent extension of the federal wind energy production tax credit (PTC) by Congress in October, 2004, teed up 2005 for an impressive growth spurt, which should bring economic development activity in rural areas, more diversity to the nation’s generating mix to reduce fuel price volatility, and clear environmental benefits to a nation that continues to demand new electricity sources.

AWEA executive director Randall Swisher said the association will continue to push for a multi-year extension of the existing PTC. Under current law, the credit will expire at the end of 2005, which could slow the industry again.

"The short-term duration of the federal production tax credit (PTC) and its repeated expirations – three in the past six years – are keeping this industry from reaching its potential to supply the nation with clean, domestic electricity," Swisher said.

Highlights of the current wind energy market outlook, according to AWEA, include:

- Wind farms already in place and those that will be installed by the end of 2005 could save over half a billion cubic feet (Bcf) of natural gas per day in 2006. Using conservative growth estimates of 3,000 MW installed every two years for the next four years, the U.S. could top 15,000 MW of installed wind power capacity by the end of 2009, which would save nearly 0.9 Bcf per day by the end of this decade. Natural gas shortages and p?ice volatility have become an increasingly familiar part of the national energy scene over the past few years.

- In 2004, seven states plus the District of Columbia passed renewable portfolio standard (RPS) legislation requiring utilities to provide a certain minimum amount of power from renewable sources such as wind and solar, bringing the total to eighteen states and the District. The citizens of Colorado made it the first state to pass an RPS by popular referendum, endorsing a measure under which Colorado’s top utilities must obtain 10 percent of the state’s power needs from renewables by 2015.

- Wind power continues to attract global power companies. In September, international power plant developer AES Corp. announced its first step into the U.S. wind market, an equity investment in US Wind Force. AES also announced on January 11 that it plans to follow that investment up with the purchase of SeaWest Holdings, a large West-coast wind project developer. The main reason cited for the SeaWest deal was that the company sees strong potential in wind as a new and expanding source of electricity. Global power generation giant Siemens announced in October that it would purchase wind turbine manufacturer Bonus Energy A/S. The company said it decided to become a wind turbine manufacturer to merge Bonus’s well-regarded technology with Siemens’ experience with large- scale utility projects.

- More than 500 utilities in 34 states now offer green pricing programs, according to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), and over 1,500 MW of wind power are currently serving the green power market.

- Project announcements for 2005 are rolling in. Four of the top five largest projects announced for construction this year are 200 MW or larger, including the 240-MW Flat Rock Phase I project in New York, the 220-MW Wild Horse project in Washington, the 200-MW Forward Wind Power project in Wisconsin, and the 200- MW Fenton project in Minnesota.