Obama unveils first US climate change strategy
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E-mail Xinhua, June 26, 2013
Some environmental groups praised Obama's new climate plan as a positive signal to the world.
"Tackling carbon pollution from power plants is the greatest opportunity and should be at the core of any serious approach to reduce U.S. emissions," Andrew Steer, president of the World Resources Institute, said in a statement. "A comprehensive climate strategy will provide businesses with greater certainty and drive investments and innovation that can charge the U.S. economy. This announcement will have ripple effects that will increase the urgency of action around the globe."
Others, however, warned that it's "not enough" to prevent catastrophic warming and extreme weather dangers predicted by scientists.
"We're happy to see the president finally addressing climate change but the plain truth is that what he's proposing isn't big enough, and doesn't move fast enough, to match the terrifying magnitude of the climate crisis," said Bill Snape, senior counsel of the Center for Biological Diversity. "This plan is a small step in the right direction but certainly begs for something bigger and bolder."
Obama has pledged that the United States would cut emissions by 17 percent by 2020 from the 2005 levels, and according to data released by the country's Environmental Protection Agency in April, emissions fell 6.9 percent from 2005 to 2011.
But for most countries, the year of 1990, rather than 2005, is the base year. Compared with that of 1990, U.S. emissions were up about 8 percent, the EPA data showed.
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