US report calls on Asia to cut greenhouse gases

Failing to implement cleaner technologies will result in heat-trapping greenhouse gases more than tripling by 2030 for much of Asia, USAID’s report said. The report calls on Asian nations, including China and India, to increase renewable energy such as wind and biomass tenfold.

“This report helps prioritise the best options to start addressing climate change and energy challenges in developing Asia today,” said Olivier Carduner, director of USAID’s regional mission in Bangkok.

While echoing some of the findings reached early this month by the UN-affiliated Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the USAID report was dismissed by some environmentalists, who have chided the US—the world’s biggest polluter—for attempting to avoid international action on climate change.

The US is one of only two industrialised countries, along with Australia, that did not ratify the Kyoto Protocol, which calls for parties to cut emissions by 5 per cent below their 1990 level by 2012.