12.05.05

Cantwell Calls on Bush to Stop Ignoring Global Warming

Senators Underscore Importance of Cooperation, Common Sense Steps as Nations Attend Climate Change Summit in Montreal

WASHINGTON, D.C. – As 189 nations, including the United States, meet to discuss how to halt global warming, U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) joined with a bipartisan group of 24 Senators to call on President George Bush to work with the rest of the world in dealing with climate change. In a letter Monday to the President and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the Senators reiterated the importance of living up to America’s treaty obligation to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions in a way that prevents interference with the climate system.

"Global climate change is real and it isn’t going away," said Cantwell, a member of both the Senate Commerce and Energy Committees, which together have primary jurisdiction over climate change issues. "I am troubled that the administration has turned a cold shoulder to global warming. We need to work with the rest of the world to develop solutions and creative ways to slow or stop the growth of greenhouse gas emissions. Let’s put American ingenuity to work on the problem, rather than burdening our children with a much more difficult task."

Between November 28 and December 9, 2005, representatives from almost every country in the world will meet in Montreal, Canada to discuss future actions that can be taken under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to reduce and prevent global warming. The United States is a signatory to the UNFCCC treaty, which states the agreed-upon goal of "preventing dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system." At the summit, 157 parties that signed on to the recently ratified Kyoto Protocol will also meet, with the United States attending as an observer.

Cantwell’s urgings come after the United States Senate agreed earlier this year that human-induced climate change is real and that mandatory steps should be taken to slow or stop the growth of greenhouse gas emissions.