China environment agency gets more power

China's government is boosting the authority of its environmental watchdog agency in an attempt to rein in the rampant pollution that has become a byproduct of the nation's rapid economic growth.

The State Environmental Protection Agency, known as SEPA, is to be upgraded to a full Cabinet ministry with a bigger budget and more people, said a former agency official and environmental activists briefed on the plans.

The upgrade is part of a government restructuring approved this week by the Communist Party leadership. The changes, expected to be formally approved by the national legislature in March, are meant to help one of China's weakest agencies grapple with one of the country's biggest problems.

Environmental degradation has fouled the air in Chinese cities and poisoned farmland and water sources, leading to protests at home and drawing criticism abroad. The environmental agency, formed in 1998, has struggled to enforce rules that are often ignored.

"SEPA in recent years has been trying to do a lot with very little," said Alex Wang, director of the China Environmental Law Project at the Natural Resources Defense Council. "The challenge that SEPA faces now first and foremost is insufficient resources and authority."

Under the plan, the agency would become the Ministry of Environment, said Hongjun Zhang, a former agency official and environmental law expert, and Lo Sze Ping of Greenpeace in Beijing.

Zhang said the staff could be increased from 200 people to 300 or 400, and that over time the body would be given more authority over local environmental bureaus, which tend to be beholden to local industries and politicians and often flout the rules.

The environmental agency declined to comment on the changes.

Beijing's filthy air has drawn international attention with the city set to host the Olympics in August. Global warming activists criticize China's emissions of greenhouse gases.

The World Bank, in a draft report with China's environmental agency, estimates the country's air and water pollution cost about $100 billion a year — 5.8 percent of its economic output — mainly through health costs. The government spends 1.35 percent of the gross domestic product on environmental protection.

Even with new powers, the environmental watchdog is likely to face formidable opposition from local governments geared to ramping up economic growth and protecting factories that pay tax revenues.

Local environmental officials also will still answer to provincial or local governments, leaving the new ministry understaffed for the task policing the environment, activists said.

Governors: Include coal in energy debate

Governors pushing alternative energy development are not shying from coal, a major culprit in global warming but also a homegrown energy source and an economic lifeline for many states.

Leaders of coal-rich states say clean-coal technology is a must. Governors from states without coal want more evidence the technology works.

"There's no doubt there's a tension and there's no doubt there is very rapidly growing public opposition to coal," said Gov. Jim Doyle, D-Wis. His state relies heavily on coal for power although Wisconsin is not a coal producer.

Energy tops the agenda at the governors' annual winter meeting. The group's new clean energy initiative seeks to promote renewable fuels such as ethanol and biodiesel and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

"Next-generation coal is going to need to continue to be part of our energy future for this country," said GOP Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, chairman of the National Governors Association.

"It is abundant, it is available, it is Americanized in the sense that we control the supply," he said Saturday. "We would be incomplete and doing a disservice to the debate and the ultimate policy direction that we're going to take if we don't envision coal being part of that."

Next-generation coal typically refers to capturing and somehow sequestering or storing the carbon that coal produces. It also envisions reducing or eliminating emissions as coal is burned.

Pawlenty has embraced renewable fuels such as corn-based ethanol and conservation, but he also promotes clean-coal technology.

Such technology is a rallying cry for many coal-producing states. They say it is possible to continue relying on the fossil fuel while minimizing its impact on the environment.

Gov. Ed Rendell, D-Pa., envisions an economic turnaround if clean-coal technology takes off.

"Coal states would be back in business big time and the economies would flourish," said Rendell, the association's vice chairman.

Presidents of two of the country's biggest power companies urged governors not to dismiss coal, calling it the country's most abundant energy resource.

"We cannot ignore coal, we cannot demonize coal," said Thomas Farrell, chairman of Richmond, Va.-based Dominion Resources Inc.

Michael Morris, chairman of Columbus, Ohio-based American Electric Power Co., said "the whole notion of delegitimizing coal is something we should all be frightened of."

Gov. John Baldacci, D-Maine, needs to hear more before he would include clean-coal technology among the promising energy ideas for the country. His state promotes renewable energy produced through wind, solar and even tides.

"You have to deal with the coal states, but I don't think you want them doing more of what they're doing until they change what they're doing and make it truly the next generation," he said in an interview.

"Not just say clean-coal technology, but really do clean-coal technology."

Proponents say all energy sources have their problems. The key, says Gov. Brian Schweitzer, D-Mont., is a national energy policy with many options and sources.

That is important because electricity demand will increase in the future. For instance, Schweitzer predicted that 10 years from now a significant number of cars will be plug-in hybrid vehicles, which will require more power plants, not fewer.

Coal "has a CO2 problem, wind has a reliability problem, solar has a price problem, nukes have a price and radiation problem," Schweitzer said. "So all of those technologies have opportunities. but they all have problems — coal's no different."

He added, "What I can say about coal, is we have it. We have it in a greater supply than anyplace else on the planet."

Doyle, the Wisconsin governor, said the emerging consensus is a mix of approaches. He said the state's reliance on coal for electricity will decline but definitely not disappear.

Wolves to be removed from species list

Gray wolves in the Northern Rockies will be removed from the endangered species list, following a 13-year restoration effort that helped the animal's population soar, federal officials said Thursday.

An estimated 1,500 wolves now roam Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. That represents a dramatic turnaround for a predator that was largely exterminated in the U.S. outside of Alaska in the early 20th century.

"Gray wolves in the Northern Rocky Mountains are thriving and no longer require the protection of the Endangered Species Act," said Interior Deputy Secretary Lynn Scarlett. "The wolf's recovery in the Northern Rocky Mountains is a conservation success story."

The restoration effort, however, has been unpopular with ranchers and many others in the three states since it began in the mid-1990s, and today some state leaders want the population thinned significantly.

The states are planning to allow hunters to target the animals as soon as this fall. That angers environmental groups, which plan to sue over the delisting and say it's too soon to remove federal protection.

"The enduring hostility to wolves still exists," said Earthjustice attorney Doug Honnold, who is preparing the lawsuit. "We're going to have hundreds of wolves killed under state management. It's a sad day for our wolves."

Plans submitted by Idaho, Montana and Wyoming indicate the states will likely maintain between 900 and 1,250 wolves for the foreseeable future, federal officials said.

Wolves have increasingly preyed on livestock as they expanded into new territories. At the same time, ranchers and wildlife agents have made more wolf kills, which are allowed under the Endangered Species Act in response to livestock conflicts.

Since the late 1980s, 724 wolves have been killed legally, and roughly the same number are estimated to have been killed illegally by poachers. Despite that, the overall population has continued to grow at the rate of 24 percent a year.

"We've been managing wolves pretty aggressively for livestock problems, but there are still a ton of wolves over a big area," said Ed Bangs, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist who led the wolf recovery effort.

The wolf was nearly wiped out in the West through a government eradication program in the 1930s that included widespread poisoning of wolves. In the late 1980s the wolf had just 200 square miles of territory around Glacier National Park, in Montana near the Canadian border.

Wolves were listed as endangered in 1974, and the government has spent more than $27 million on recovery efforts in the Northern Rockies.

Since an initial 66 wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park and central Idaho in the mid-1990s, their population has grown rapidly. The wolf's territory now covers an estimated 113,000 square miles, Bangs said.

The wolf will be formally removed from the endangered species list 30 days after the federal government's decision is published in the Federal Register, which is expected next week.

Meanwhile, wildlife agencies in the three states have already begun crafting rules for wolf hunts. Officials say the hunts will be similar to those for other big game species such as mountain lions and black bears.

In Montana, state wildlife commissioners this week adopted regulations for a hunt to begin this fall. Idaho also is eyeing a fall hunt, and Wyoming plans to complete its plans in the next few months.

Limits on how many wolves could be killed in each state have not been set.

Public hunting could significantly decrease the size of the wolf's range. It could also reduce the chance of wolves spreading to neighboring states such as Utah, Colorado, Oregon and Washington.

Environmental groups critical of such hunts say the government should be moving in the opposite direction, restoring wolves to areas where they are not now found.

The only other areas of the lower 48 states where gray wolves live are the western Great Lakes and the Southwest. A population of about 4,000 wolves in Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin was dropped from the endangered list last year, while a reintroduced population of dozens of animals in Arizona and New Mexico has struggled to expand.

In a petition filed Wednesday with the Department of Interior, Defenders of Wildlife and the Natural Resource Defense Council argued new wolf populations should be established in Maine, New York, Oregon, Colorado, Utah, Washington and possibly New Hampshire, Texas and portions of the mid-Atlantic.

Federal officials said Thursday there were no immediate plans to reintroduce wolves into other states or regions.

However, an independent wolf biologist said he would be "shocked" if the animal again ends up on the endangered list.

"The last thing any of the states want is for wolves to be re-listed by the federal government," said Daniel Pletscher, director of the University of Montana's wildlife biology program. He added that tolerance of wolves has grown immensely since the species was nearly wiped out.

Gore warns on 'subprime carbon' industry

Al Gore advised Wall Street leaders and institutional investors Thursday to ditch businesses too reliant on carbon-intensive energy — or prepare for huge losses down the road.

"You need to really scrub your investment portfolios, because I guarantee you — as my longtime good redneck friends in Tennessee say, I guarandamntee you — that if you really take a fine-tooth comb and go through your portfolios, many of you are going to find them chock-full of subprime carbon assets," the former vice president said.

Carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels is the leading component of "greenhouse gases," which scientists say are playing a key role in warming the globe.

Gore's remarks before a high-profile business crowd that collectively controls some $20 trillion in capital were intended to unleash a financial ripple effect that could force the world to start putting a price on carbon emissions.

Gore, who shared the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to warn about climate change, compared the financial risks facing investors in carbon-using industries with the meltdown in the market for subprime mortgages given to people with blemished credit records or low incomes.

"Similarly, the assumption that you can safely invest in assets that come from business models that assume carbon is free is an assumption that is about to go splat," he said. "You have lots of assets, many of you do, in your portfolios right now that truly do deserve that epithet 'subprime.'"

The U.N. played host to nearly 500 prominent financial leaders and institutional investors who came searching for insights on shifting business currents as the world shifts to cleaner energy sources and fuels.

"As soon as people believe carbon has a price, it's going to have a price," said Vinod Khosla, a venture capitalist who was one of the co-founders of Sun Microsystems.

Peter Darbee, chairman and CEO of PG&E Corp., an energy-based company in San Francisco, said cleaner-burning utilities should be rewarded and "those that burn coal should have to pay for clean energy."

The conference, which followed three days of debate in the U.N. General Assembly on what to do about climate change, was organized by three groups that support the United Nations — the U.N. Foundation, Ceres and the U.N. Fund for International Partnerships.

Mindy Lubber, president of Ceres' investor coalition, called it the largest meeting of financial leaders to focus on climate change.

At the last such meeting in 2005, participants pledged to invest $1 billion in clean energy technologies and followed up by doing that in less than a year.

"The shift towards a greener future is still in its infancy and needs nurturing," U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told participants Thursday. "While the world looks to the U.N. to steward the negotiating process, the United Nations looks to you, as leaders in the financial sector, to lead in innovating financing and technological development."

In December, U.N.-sponsored climate talks in Bali, Indonesia, produced a "Bali Roadmap" for new negotiations intended to produce a global treaty on reducing greenhouse gases. It would replace the Kyoto Protocol, which covers just 37 industrial nations and expires in 2012.

Timothy Wirth, president of the U.N. Foundation, called the drive to adopt new energy sources would prove to be "as important as the computer revolution in generating new wealth and jobs."

One longtime champion of such a shift calls it a total makeover of the $6 trillion world energy economy. Fred Krupp, president of Environmental Defense, argues in his upcoming book, "Earth: The Sequel," that the search for a technological fix to global warming will produce new industries, jobs and private fortunes.

Krupp's group has worked with General Motors Corp., DuPont Co. and other companies in calling for U.S. limits on greenhouse gases to combat global warming.

"There'll be a whole cascade of private capital flowing to remaking the energy infrastructure of our world, because it's a multitrillion-dollar business," Krupp told The Associated Press. "Increasingly, you're seeing this point of view not only in America, but with politicians in other countries as well."

UN debate keys on rich nation emissions

Envoys from India, China and other developing nations offered Wednesday to hold the line on their greenhouse gas emissions, but only as measured against the per-capita pollution produced by the United States and other richer nations.

The U.S. emits about 7 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases a year. China, with 1.3 billion people, has pulled roughly even with that amount, but its emissions per person are roughly one-fourth that in the U.S., which is home to 300 million.

A recurring theme during the U.N. General Assembly's debate this week on climate change was that the United States and other wealthy nations bear a greater responsibility for adding more gases to the atmosphere that contribute to global warming by trapping heat.

"The reality is that developed countries are responsible for the bulk of current and historical greenhouse gas emissions," said Vanu Gopala Menon, Singapore's ambassador to the U.N. "So clearly, they have an obligation to take the lead in reducing emissions."

Indian Ambassador Nirupam Sen said his government would keep its greenhouse gas emissions at a per capita level below that of developed countries.

Chinese envoy Yu Qingtai told The Associated Press that China would try to keep a lid on its growing gas emissions when compared to U.S. per capita emissions.

"I cannot accept the argument that I, as a Chinese, am only entitled legally to one quarter of what you are entitled to," he told AP. But, he added, "being equal to an American when it comes to per capita emissions would be a nightmare for the Chinese."

So many nations wanted to speak during the General Assembly's planned two-day conference that a third day of speechmaking was added Wednesday. It was not clear whether that was a benefit.

"For Papua New Guinea, and I suspect many other countries, the time for mind-numbing debate has passed. The time for leadership has arrived!" said that nation's ambassador, Robert Aisi. "We cannot idly watch our island communities slip silently under the waves of sea level rise, our villages torn apart by cyclones of increasing fury or our children die of new virulent diseases."

Numerous poorer nations appealed for help in adapting to a warming world. The U.N. Development Program estimates industrialized nations must provide $86 billion a year by 2015 to help the most vulnerable people adapt to climate change.

"The developed countries will have to shoulder a bigger responsibility, but the developing countries will also have to play their part," said Turkish Ambassador Baki Ilkin.

John McNee, Canada's ambassador, said his nation is committed "to meeting our obligations" as part of a climate treaty that includes the participation of "all major emitters" — including fast-developing nations as well as industrialized nations.

A day earlier, Alejandro Wolff, deputy U.S. ambassador, said the United States would "do our part to contribute to this global effort."

The conference was called by General Assembly President Srgjan Kerim, a Macedonian diplomat and economics professor, both to shape U.N. policy and to support its efforts to craft a new climate treaty for mandatory greenhouse gas reductions within two years. It would replace the Kyoto Protocol, which covers only developed nations and expires in 2012.

Philippines to ban incandescent bulbs

The Philippines will phase out incandescent bulbs by 2010 in favor of more energy-efficient fluorescent globes to help cut greenhouse gas emissions and household costs, the president said Tuesday.

Acknowledging similar moves in Canada and Australia, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo called for a ban on incandescent bulbs.

"Like Australia, we should phase out incandescent lights by 2010," Arroyo said in her closing remarks at the Philippine Energy Summit.

The Asian Development Bank, a technical adviser at the summit, lauded the Philippine plan as a first in Asia. It said the most effective way to reduce the demand for electricity and greenhouse gases was to use energy more efficiently.

The bank "will support and encourage other developing countries to follow the Government of Philippines' lead and make the switch to more energy-efficient products like compact fluorescent lamps," Thomas Crouch, deputy director general of ADB's Southeast Asia Department said in a statement.

The Manila-based development bank said it was considering extending a $30 million loan to the Philippines to help fund energy-efficiency programs, including projects for low-income families to mitigate the financial impact of changing from incandescent globes to the more expensive fluorescent alternative.

Fluorescent bulbs need just 20 percent of the electricity that incandescent bulbs use to produce the same amount of light. They also last six to ten times longer than the average incandescent bulb.

The Asian Development Bank said the switch would cut household lighting costs by as much as 80 percent and — because the amount of electricity used would be drastically lower — reduce the Philippines' annual greenhouse gas emissions by 2.2 million tons starting in 2010.

Three years ago, Cuban government workers went door to door in many neighborhoods replacing incandescent light bulbs with more-efficient alternatives to counter crippling energy blackouts across the island. The scheme inspired Venezuela to give away energy-saving fluorescent light bulbs.

Bush wants to beef up Earth monitoring

After years cutting of budgets for tracking global warming, President Bush on Monday proposed more than a $1 billion increase over the next five years for launching more and better Earth-observing satellites.

The president's 2009 budget provides money for six new NASA satellites to watch Earth's changes, costing at least $910 million over the next five years.

It also calls for an increase of more than $200 million for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's weather satellites and climate monitoring, including restoration of key instruments that had been cut from a troubled and delayed weather satellite.

NASA had not approved a new Earth sciences mission in four years and the number of NASA Earth-observing satellites either in orbit or in the pipeline had dropped from 26 in 2004 to 21 last month.

A critical report last year by the National Academy of Sciences contended the government was unprepared for collecting vital information about global warming. It noted that NASA's Earth sciences research budget had been effectively cut by 30 percent since 2000 and the report prompted changes in the government's Earth observing plans, officials said.

"Think of NASA's blue logo as turning a little bit greener," NASA sciences chief Alan Stern told The Associated Press Monday. "We are amping up our emphasis on Earth sciences."

Two new satellites, listed as top priorities by the National Academy, were included in Bush's budget proposal. They would map critical soil moisture around the world and replace an aging satellite that monitors shrinking ice worldwide. The NASA budget includes money for four other satellites, but the agency hasn't yet decided which ones to build, Stern said.

New satellites are crucial to see changes in water, soil, ice and air to act as early warnings for global warming changes yet to come, scientists said.

"This is the right time for Earth observations," said White House science adviser Jack Marburger. "Everyone's concerned about climate change."

Richard Anthes, a past president of the American Meteorological Society who co-chaired the National Academy report, called the new budget an improvement, but said it "does not go far enough." He said it is about $850 million short of what the academy recommended over the next three years.

On the energy emissions that cause global warming, the president's proposed budget would cut spending on energy efficiency and renewable energy by $500 million, but would increase spending on "clean coal" technologies for power plants and nuclear power.

Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., who chairs a special House global warming committee, called the budget an investment in "the dirty fuels of the past."