Environmentalists panned Prime Minister Stephen Harper's pitch on intensity-based targets as a solution for a looming climate impasse at the G8.
"Not only is it embarrassing for Canada because we're going to be selling something that doesn't work, it will be problematic for the planet because we're pushing something that doesn't work," said Julia Langer of the World Wildlife Fund in Ottawa on Monday.
In Germany ahead of the G8 summit that begins Wednesday, Harper told a business audience that Canada will not meet its Kyoto targets before making his intensity pitch.
Harper blamed the previous Liberal government for failing to effectively address climate change.
"Frankly, up to now, our country has been engaged in a lot of 'talking the talk,' but not, `walking the walk,' when it comes to greenhouse gases," he said.
"Our predecessors in government committed our country to the Kyoto protocol ... and then they did nothing to achieve this goal."
The Conservative party's predecessors vigorously opposed Kyoto and Harper himself once vowed to kill it. The Liberal government tabled a plan in April 2005 (Kyoto was globally ratified in February 2005) that it claimed would have made Canada Kyoto-compliant, but the Conservatives shelved it after taking power in early 2006.
The prime minister claimed Canada's economy could face devastation if it attempted to cut its emissions six per cent below 1990 levels, as called for in Kyoto. Under the latest Conservative plan, Canada won't achieve its Kyoto target until 2025 instead of 2012.
But Harper said his government has a solution that the entire planet can follow -- intensity-based greenhouse-gas reduction targets.
The intensity system calls for less pollution per unit of production but has been widely blasted by environmentalists who say it offers no absolute guarantees that emissions will ever go down.
For example, Canada's economy grew by 47 per cent between 1990 and 2003, but GHG rose more slowly -- they went up by 27 per cent. That's a more intensive use of energy. But overall emissions still went up.
Scientists say GHG emissions must start coming down in absolute terms.
"An intensity-based plan -- in and of itself -- just doesn't deliver the goods," Environment Minister John Baird told Newsnet from Berlin. "If it's an intensity-based plan, it's got to be twice as tough to deliver the goods."
He said the government's plan will reduce industrial GHG emissions by 33 per cent. Combined with other initiatives, emissions should go down by 20 per cent, Baird added.
Intensity-based targets were also part of previous Liberal plans.
While few governments support the system, Harper said it would allow countries like China and India to join in climate-change efforts without having to sacrifice their economies.
"We cannot afford to have the world divided on this issue, to pit right against left, Europe against America, or the developed countries against the developing world," he said.
"We need a plan that takes into account both different starting points and different national circumstances, but that moves us all towards a common destination."
India and China both signed and ratified the Kyoto Protocol. As developing countries, they were exempted from having to make cuts in the treaty's first phase, but were expected to agree to cuts in the post-Kyoto treaty.
China has released a climate policy statement, making it clear that economic growth would not be sacrificed to cut GHG emissions.
The Climate Action Network released an open letter to Harper asking him to commit to keeping the global temperature rise below two degrees Celsius and set GHG reduction targets to make that possible.
Harper described climate change as "perhaps the biggest threat to confront the future of humanity today," but he didn't endorse the two-degree target in his speech.
U.S. pressured
Harper's position on intensity-based targets is very close to that of the United States.
On Monday, the European Union, the United Nations and G8 president Germany urged the United States to stay within the UN system for negotiating a new climate treaty and not start a rival process.
Bush -- who refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol in 2001 -- unveiled a plan that would see the world's top 15 emitters meet and agree to new measures by 2008.
The UN-sponsored process meets in Bali, Indonesia in December. EU countries fear the Bush plan could sabotage that effort.
The EU wants Bush to either integrate his proposals with the UN process or clearly signal he does not intend to compete with it.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the G8 president, wants the declaration expected at the summit's conclusion on June 8 to call on the world's developed nations to ultimately reduce their emissions by between 60 per cent and 80 per cent below 1990 levels by 2050.
She also wants the declaration to include a commitment to limit the Earth's temperature rise to two degrees Celsius.
However, she has suggested unanimity on those points appears unlikely. The U.S. opposes both the two-degree target and the reduction target.
On Monday, Harper, Merkel, and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso issued a joint statement that said: "We are convinced that tackling climate change and ensuring clean, secure and affordable supplies of energy are central, interlinked global challenges."
Merkel said at a news conference she was pleased to hear Harper's suggestions, but she didn't offer any specific endorsement of his plan.
Question period
During question period on Monday, Deputy Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff accused the government of watering down its commitments instead of pressing for a global action plan.
"It's not pushing for a long-term approach. It's pushing for an approach outside of the Kyoto framework," Ignatieff said.
"What I want to know is whether the government will stand up and commit to Chancellor Merkel's plan for long-term action on global climate change?" he asked.
Government House Leader Peter van Loan responded by shifting the blame to the Liberals.
"We're very much committed to taking action on greenhouse gases," he said. "We're doing this notwithstanding having to dig ourselves out of a deep hole after many years of neglect."
NDP Leader Jack Layton echoed Ignatieff's call for the Conservatives to commit to the objectives outlined by Merkel. "The fact is the world is watching this G8 summit. The children of the world are watching," he said.
"The question is: Are we going to get action? Yes or no?" he said.
Van Loan rejected suggestions Harper hadn't taken a stand against climate change.
"Absolutely we're getting action for the first time in well over a decade on greenhouse gases with a plan that requires a reduction in our emissions by 60 to 70 per cent in greenhouse gases by 2050," he responded.
A recent analysis by the Pembina Institute said the Tories' targets are weak because they use 2006 as a baseline, not the international standard of 1990. In addition, the think tank said the plan is riddled with loopholes.
The European Union has set a target of a 20 per cent cut below 1990 levels by 2020. The Pembina Institute said the Tories' 2020 target is equivalent to being two per cent above the 1990 baseline.
The Tories say they will cut emissions by 20 per cent by 1990, but that's using 2006 as a baseline.
The Deutsche Bank has also concluded the Tories' plan will not achieve its mid-term targets.
With a report from CTV's Graham Richardson and files from The Canadian Press
