US-ENVIRONMENT Summary 

China's Wen tells EU to stick to current climate pact Skip related content

China will insist key global climate change negotiations next month build on current treaties that limit the obligations of poor countries in controlling greenhouse gas emissions, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said. In a phone call with European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso on Monday, Wen said the December meeting in Copenhagen to forge a new pact on global warming should stick to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol, the official People's daily reported on Tuesday.

Merkel to press U.S. on climate

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel is expected to urge the United States to take bold action to combat global warming in a speech to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, a month before a U.N. climate summit. Merkel, who began her second term in office last week, will meet with President Barack Obama at the White House before giving the first address to the U.S. Congress by a German leader since Konrad Adenauer in 1957.

Deforestation sped demise of Nasca in Peru: study

BARCELONA, Spain (Reuters) - The mysterious people who etched the "Nasca Lines" across deserts in Peru hastened their own demise by clearing forests 1,500 years ago, according to a study on Monday. The Nasca people, famed for the lines that depict animals or geometric shapes most clearly visible from the air, became unable to grow enough food in nearby valleys because the lack of trees made the climate too dry, scientists said.

Disney to give $7 million to reforestation projects

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The Walt Disney Co said on Tuesday it will invest $7 million in forest conservation projects in the Amazon, Congo and United States as part of its effort to reduce emissions, waste and energy use as a corporation. Disney pledged earlier this year to cut its carbon emissions from fuels by half by 2012, and ultimately to achieve net zero direct greenhouse gas emissions at its office and retail complexes, theme parks and cruise lines.

U.S. urged to set 2020 target to save climate deal

BARCELONA, Spain (Reuters) - The United States came under pressure on Monday to follow other rich countries and set a 2020 goal for cutting greenhouse gases to rescue chances for a climate deal due next month in Copenhagen. The prospective Danish hosts ratcheted up pressure on the United States at a final preparatory meeting in Barcelona, saying it could not come "empty-handed" to Copenhagen.

Kilimanjaro's ice may disappear by 2033

DAR ES SALAAM (Reuters) - The ice on Africa's highest mountain could vanish in 13 to 24 years, a fate also awaiting the continent's other glaciers, a study said Monday. U.S.-based researchers Lonnie Thompson and colleagues said glaciers on Kilimanjaro, Tanzania's snow-capped volcano which attracts 40,000 visitors a year, could disappear.

Maldives says carbon neutral goal ahead of schedule

MALE (Reuters) - The Maldives could achieve its aim of becoming carbon neutral well before its 2020 target, the Indian Ocean island nation's president said Monday. To meet the goal of making the archipelago totally free of carbon emissions, the Maldives government has been encouraging investments in power generation through wind, solar and other renewable energy sources to replace diesel.

Senate panel tries bypassing climate bill boycott

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrats who control a key U.S. Senate panel said they would begin debating a climate change bill on Tuesday, despite a planned boycott by minority Republicans who are demanding more study of the issue. Senator Barbara Boxer, the California Democrat who chairs the Environment and Public Works Committee, wants to have a bill approved by her panel before an international summit on global warming convenes in Copenhagen in December.

Landslide risk rises near Three Gorges Dam: report

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's vast Three Gorges reservoir will see a increasing number of landslides and other geological hazards as the water reaches its maximum level this autumn, a magazine report warned on Monday. The Three Gorges Dam, the world's largest, aims to tame the mighty River Yangtze and provide cheap, clean energy. Reservoir engineers began withholding outflows last September to push the dam's water level up to 175 meters (574 ft) above sea level.

Climate worries to send Nepal cabinet to Everest base

KATHMANDU (Reuters) - Nepal's cabinet plans to meet at the base camp of Mount Everest this month to highlight the impact of global warming on the Himalayas ahead of next month's U.N. negotiations on climate change, a minister said on Monday. The base camp is located about 5,300 meters (17,400 feet) up the 8,850 meter (29,035 feet) mountain and is the point from where climbers to the Everest summit begin their ascent.