EU Environment Minsters "Try To Agree" To 20% GHG Cut By Below 1990 Totals By 2020 - AP

[hatrack]

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- EU environment ministers will Tuesday try to agree they should cut greenhouse gas emissions at least 20 percent by 2020, paving the way for Europe to seek deeper reductions from other industrialized nations.

But the EU's 27 nations may be forced to delay a final decision until a March summit of EU leaders because Poland and Hungary threaten to veto a deal making the target mandatory, an EU diplomat said under condition of anonymity because no decision has yet been taken.

The European Commission said reducing carbon dioxide by 20 percent below 1990 levels is just a starting point and it would be ready to go up to 30 percent if other regions join in. The goal was needed to "focus minds that otherwise would not be quite so focused," the diplomat said.

But the two former Soviet bloc countries have grown rapidly in the last decade and fear that the target means steeper cuts for them. They both generate electricity from their own coal and changing to other forms of power would mean heavy investment.

EDIT

http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=12254