While 80 heads of state meet in New York this week to discuss climate change, as a precursor to the United Nation's December Bali summit, U.S. President Bush decided to hold his own Washington meeting late last week, emphasizing, critics say, his determination to not collaborate with the majority of the rest of the world in pollution reduction planning.

In what looked like a rival summit, Bush discussed voluntary emission caps with 15 of the world’s biggest polluters, as well as delegates from the U.N. and the European Union. Participating countries included India, China and Brazil, countries that are not required to make cuts to greenhouse gas emissions under the Kyoto Protocol; Australia, the only other developed country that refused to sign onto Kyoto; and a number of other large countries. Iran, one of the biggest polluters, was not represented.

Rather than setting itself apart from U.N. talks, some believe it is imperative that the U.S. join with other nations to mitigate the causes and effects of global warming.

The leadership role of the United States is absolutely essential. Unless the United States decides that it wants to be a major and committed leadership player in this and make very specific commitments, much of the rest of the world is effectively going to hide behind the skirts of the United States and not do anything. - Timothy E. Wirth, former Clinton Administration senator and environmental official, now president of the United Nations Foundation

President Bush has surprised climate change commentators by raising the profile of global warming initiatives recently. The president’s rhetoric has shifted significantly from 2001 statements when he refuted scientific evidence of the existence and causes of global warming. Six years on, he announces that voluntary measures, innovation in the industrial sector and international cooperation are necessary to head off further accumulation of greenhouse gases and the resultant environmental effects. This comes soon after Bush’s senior scientific advisor, Professor John Marburger, told the BBC that there was a 90 percent certainty that human activity contributed to increased greenhouse gases and global warming.

Rather than sign onto the Kyoto Protocol, Bush is firmly committed to his “city on a hill” plan to encourage American industry to voluntarily reduce their contributions to greenhouse gases, supposedly leading the world by example, rather than subjecting businesses to any kind of compulsory cap on emissions.

“It’s our philosophy that each nation has the sovereign capacity to decide for itself what its own portfolio of policies should be.” - James L. Connaughton, the president’s chief environmental adviser

Critics of voluntary emissions reduction in the industrial sector remain skeptical that Bush’s plan will lead to any reduction in pollution.

Congress needs to lead. The president is not giving us the leadership we need. Ultimately what we need are mandatory caps. No air pollution problem in the world has ever been solved without having legal limits. - Fred Krupp, president of Environmental Defense

At the Major Economies Meeting on Energy Security and Climate Change last Friday in Washington, Bush proposed a summit next year to discuss ways to limit greenhouse gas emissions and strategies for funding clean industry initiatives in developing countries. These countries, historically, have not contributed as much pollution toward climate change as developed nations, but are fast becoming major polluters in the wake of burgeoning capitalist industry.

Spectators from other countries are pleased to see Bush’s shift in position, after his disappointing retreat from Kyoto in 2001.

We see a re-engagement by the US in the international negotiation process. - Portuguese Deputy Environment Minister Humberto Rosa, representing the EU. - World Business Council for Sustainable Development

Others, however, feel that the city on a hill is out of touch with the rest of the world.

One of the striking features of this meeting is how isolated this administration has become. There is absolutely no support that I can see in the international community that we can drive this effort on the basis of voluntary efforts. – John Ashton, special representative on climate change for the British foreign secretary

The US administration must support the UN process and not undermine it.

"The timing of President Bush's meeting risks creating a rival process to the formal UN effort to secure an agreement that builds on Kyoto to reduce global carbon emissions," says Hans Verolme, Director of WWF's Global Climate Change Programme. "President Bush should commit the US to the UN process and the results of the climate summit of Heads of State just held in New York."

Voluntary cuts in emissions are not enough. - WWF

The climate debate continues with some uncertainty as major players seem reticent to make the sorts of commitments that might encourage developing nations to follow suit. Specifically, developed countries are not committed to the U.N.’s targeted two-thirds reduction in greenhouse gas emissions that is necessary by 2050 to keep global warming down to around 2 degrees Celsius, a target emphasized in a video at the opening of the New York conference. Biggest amongst the players is the U.S. who has made no concrete commitments, even if Bush is beginning to talk the sort of language climate observers prefer to hear. The U.S. remains within the U.N. Framework Convention of Climate Control but outside of the Kyoto Protocol that all other developed countries, other than Australia, have signed on to.

Bush might have pleased some with his sweet climate change talk, but he has alarmed others with his nuclear talk. Nuclear power is presented by the Bush Administration as one of the most important alternatives to fossil fuel power. This route of thinking alarms many other nations who see nuclear technology as devastating when it goes wrong (Chernobyl) and worse when used as a weapon.

At the 62nd annual U.N. General Assembly Meeting in New York, global warming talks continue into this week. While the U.S. president may seem slow to commit to measures to curb emissions, some of the 154 speakers at the meeting were much more earnest.

Speaker after speaker in New York pounded out the need for urgency. Some demanded the world halve its greenhouse-gas emissions by the middle of the century to limit the worst damage. – World Business Council for Sustainable Development

U.N. secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, is looking forward to measures that build on initiatives developed as a result of the Kyoto Protocol that specifies reductions in greenhouse gases up to 2012. As this target date looms and gains toward pollution reduction targets remain unclear, Mr Ban sees the urgency in perpetuating momentum created by Kyoto. By 2009, he sees the need for a new protocol that continues the work of Kyoto, and expects meetings in Bali in December to begin this process.

Climate change is a challenge to our leadership, skills and vision and we have to address that challenge boldly. – Ban Ki-moon