■ European Union leaders, also meeting with Obama at the White House, pressed anew for US action and for a larger US contribution to an international aid fund to help developing countries adapt to a warmer world.
■ In Barcelona, African delegates to a preliminary climate conference briefly boycotted the discussions over their concern that industrial nations will not have to make significant enough reductions in greenhouse gases.
■ Al Gore, a leading voice for action on global warming, said he expects Obama to visit the Copenhagen conference to reinforce the country’s commitment.
The White House and Democratic leaders in Congress have essentially abandoned prospects of getting a climate bill to the president’s desk before the Copenhagen conference Dec. 7. But the president and congressional leaders hope a show of progress will show the world the US is taking climate change seriously.
However, when Senator Barbara Boxer of California convened her environment committee to start voting on the 959-page climate bill she and Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts had fashioned, she was faced with a Republican boycott. Only Senator George Voinovich of Ohio showed up and he stayed only for 15 minutes to demand a closer analysis of the bill’s cost and impact on jobs.
The bill calls for cutting greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and industrial facilities 20 percent by 2020 and 83 percent by mid-century. Republicans say the bill amounts to a massive energy tax because it would force a shift away from cheaper fossil fuels such as coal and raise electricity and other energy prices.
Voinovich said an analysis by the Environmental Protection Agency cited by Boxer falls far short of what is needed and was based on a House-passed bill that he said is significantly different from the bill before the Senate.
