*http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1209/30421.html *
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*U.S. in Copenhagen: All about Obama*
By: Lisa Lerer
December 10, 2009 05:14 AM EST
COPENHAGEN --- Delegates and advocates who traveled to last year's U.N.
climate talks in Poland have a clear memory of the U.S. presence there:
a sign on a closed door that said "Executive Branch Personnel Only."
One year and a new president later, things couldn't be more different in
Copenhagen.
Gone are the windowless rooms and the tiny exhibit-hall booth the
government favored in the Bush years.
In their place is a large and inviting U.S. center with a 100-seat
theater open to anyone who wants to stop by for briefings by top
administration officials. An adjoining reception room features posters
and printed materials, a basketball-size globe signed by former Vice
President Al Gore and a much larger one that drops down from the ceiling
and flashes with animation as U.S. scientists explain the effects of
global warming.
Inside, there's free coffee. Outside, free posters of the Earth at night.
But what the glitzy U.S. center can't offer is the one thing many
conference participants want: firm U.S. commitments to cut
greenhouse-gas emissions and to provide billions of dollars to help poor
countries deal with the impact of global warming.
"I don't like to promise things that aren't in my pocket," chief U.S.
negotiator Todd Stern told reporters Wednesday.
Administration officials can't say for certain what the United States
will or won't do because Congress hasn't passed its climate bill yet. So
instead, the White House is trying to win over delegates and other
conference participants by reminding them that there's a new president
in town --- and one who has already proved himself committed to action
on climate issues.
It starts outside the center; the exterior walls are emblazoned with the
words "U.S. Center '09," with the zero shaped like the letter "O" and
filled with red, white and blue --- a graphic echo of the president's
iconic campaign logo. Step inside for a briefing, and it seems that
every other sentence begins with the words "Under President Obama."
"We are as a government under the Obama administration doing everything
we can to move forward on this issue," Environmental Protection Agency
Administrator Lisa Jackson said during a briefing at the center
Wednesday. "We acknowledge our responsibility. and we acknowledge that
we have to make up for lost time."
So many people turned out for Jackson's talk that they spilled out of
the center's open doors; some crowded around flat-screen TVs in the next
room to hear what she had to say about the climate bill, negotiations
and endangerment finding.Conference participants will have many more
opportunities to hear from administration officials. Five Cabinet
members plan to speak at the U.S. center during the conference, and at
least six other high-level administration officials will travel to
Copenhagen for the talks: Council on Environmental Quality Chairwoman
Nancy Sutley, special climate adviser Carol Browner, deputy U.S.
national security adviser Michael Froman, top science adviser John
Holdren and Ed Fendley, who handles climate change for the National
Security Council.
Those officials are not part of the official U.S. negotiating team and
will play little role in the actual talks. Instead, they'll be here to
establish the administration's climate change bona fides by touting its
green achievements: the $80 billion in stimulus funding for clean
energy, new fuel economy standards, more stringent appliance efficiency
standards and this week's decision by the EPA opening the door to
administrative regulation of greenhouse-gas emissions from industrial
polluters.
"The message is: We're serious; look beyond the fact that Congress
hasn't acted," says Peter Goldmark, director of the Climate and Air
program for the Environmental Defense Fund.
A spokesman for the U.S. effort here said funding for the center comes
out of the State Department's budget, but he could not say how much is
being spent --- nor would he allow his name to be used in print. Asked
about U.S. hopes for the center, he would say only that "the center is
part of the Obama administration's larger commitment to meeting the
clean energy challenge."
Of course, poor and developing countries eventually want to see more
than a fancy conference pavilion. They accuse the United States of
trying to structure a global agreement that would allow rich nations to
avoid making steep reductions in greenhouse gases --- and leave poor
nations to suffer --- and they're looking to President Barack Obama to
swoop into Copenhagen and set matters straight.
"Global peace and security is not served by isolationism and
exceptionalism," said Lumumba Di-Aping, the Sudanese chairman of the
G-77 group of developing countries. We humbly ask President Obama that
the new dawn of multilateralism that he promised the world should not be
simply business as usual."
The Obama administration has promised to cut greenhouse gas emissions 17
percent below 2005 levels by 2020, a figure that mirrors legislation
passed by the House in late June. Officials have also promised to
contribute a "fair share" of a proposed $10 billion annual fund to help
poor nations fight climate change.
The developing nations want steeper cuts and more money --- commitments
they're unlikely to get from the American delegation.
Obama officials recognize that --- for all the hospitality --- their
opening position at the climate talks has been deeply disappointing to
many here. When Stern took the stage in March at climate talks in Bonn,
Germany --- his debut as the chief negotiator for the new president ---
delegates greeted him with a standing ovation.
Stern doesn't expect a repeat --- for himself or for Obama.
"I thought it would be unlikely that I would get another one, and I
think that prediction is going to be true," Stern said. "Mostly, we're
not worrying about standing ovations; we'd like to get a deal done."
© 2009 Capitol News Company, LLC
<http://www.irides.com>
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