Asia Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate

The Asia Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate is an international agreement between Australia, United States, China, India, Japan and South Korea which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through the transfer of technology. It is non-binding on any of the parties.

The six members of the Partnership together account for almost half of the world's global greenhouse gas pollution. But the partnership includes no targets for greenhouse gas reductions, no timetable for achieving goals, and no incentives for governments or corporations to actually reduce greenhouse emissions.

The first meeting of the Partnership in Sydney, Australia in January 2006. The meeting involved 60 government representatives meeting in total secrecy with 120 industry representatives from the world's largest corporations in coal, nuclear, aluminium, cement and steel sectors. All nongovernmental organizations were excluded from the meeting. Even the media was not allowed inside the talks.

"The countries involved aren't meeting to find ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. They are meeting with the CEOs of the big oil and coal companies to work out how to save their industries," Cate Faehrmann, director of the Nature Conservation Council of NSW, said. ]

The outcome of the meeting was a pledge by Australia and the US to provide A$445 million of funding for clean energy projects over the next five years. This represents a tiny fraction of the billions of dollars of subsidies provided by these countries to fossil fuel industries. Analysis show's that under the plan, global greenhouse gas emissions would more than double by 2050. 

Environment group WWF Australia said that "A 100 per cent increase in global greenhouse gas emissions, as allowed under the new Partnership plan, would lock the world into a four-degree rise in average global surface temperatures." 

Companies involved at the inaugural meeting include:
 * Nippon Steel
 * Tokyo Electric Power Company
 * ExxonMobil
 * Rio Tinto
 * Peabody Energy Corp
 * Portland Cement
 * American Electric Power
 * Origin Energy
 * BP Solar
 * Woodside
 * Westpac
 * Alcoa

Other Sourcewatch Resources

 * Climate change
 * Climate change sceptics
 * Global Climate Coalition
 * Global Warming Cost website
 * Kyoto Protocol

External resources

 * Wikipedia article, Asia-Pacific Partnership for Clean Development and Climate
 * Ben Crystall, Clean energy special: The big clean-up, NewScientist.com news service, 3 September 2005.
 * Wendy Frew Greens to miss out on green summit The Age, January 9, 2006.
 * Lobby group slams govt's climate pact, AAP, November 25, 2005.
 * Environmentalists slam inaugural climate change meeting in Australia, China Post, 8/1/06.