select committee on energy independence and global warming for those of you who have spent any time in the water this summer you may have noticed that it was warmer than usual on the east coast typically chilly maine beaches felt more like those usually found in maryland which were in turn feeling more like florida worldwide ocean temperatures in july were the hottest recorded in the last one hundred and thirty years while this might benefit your beach weekend now it is the latest reminder of the serious consequences of global warming as the oceans warm and become more acidic due to increasing absorption of carbon dioxide coral reefs and other critical components of the ocean ecosystem are put at risk threatening food supplies for a significant portion of the world global warming is a global problem in need of a global solution the next opportunity to find that global solution is coming quickly in december the nations of the world will gather in copenhagen intent on finalizing an international climate agreement that will protect people and the planet and unleash a clean energy revolution todd stern the united states special envoy for climate change is with us today to report on the progress made thus far and the challenges that remain to reaching an agreement in copenhagen since the start of the select committee on energy independence and global warming i have maintained that the most effective way of advancing the negotiations of the next international climate change agreement would be for the united states to show leadership by committing to mandatory domestic reductions of heat trapping pollution in june the house of representatives took the first step by passing the waxman markey american clean energy and security act to the rest of the world house passage of this bill signaled america's growing commitment to preventing climate change and building a global clean energy economy it helped leaders at the g and the major economies forum held in italy this july reach agreement on important points including the need for emissions to peak as soon as possible commitments to prepare low carbon growth plans and a pledge by developing countries to take actions that would meaningfully reduce their emissions from their current trajectories i look forward to working with my senate colleagues so that we can send the strongest possible signal from the united states congress to the negotiations in copenhagen sending clean energy legislation that reduces global warming pollution to president obama is not just important for international diplomacy it is critical to our national interest the great race of the st century will be to provide affordable clean energy to the world whether countries are trying to revitalize flagging economies or pull their people out of poverty they are turning to clean energy technology in a race that the united states once had a clear lead we are now falling behind the europeans japanese and increasingly the chinese are using their domestic policies to drive the development of clean energy industries and stake their claims to the burgeoning global clean energy economy if we want to be globally competitive we must do the same the united states effort to reverse the trend began with the two thousand and seven energy bill's increase in fuel economy standards and commitment to renewable fuels accelerated with the eighty dollars billion investment in clean energy infrastructure and technology in this year's recovery act it will culminate with a comprehensive clean energy law like the waxman markey legislation that passed the house this summer the world is watching the united states we should be responding to that concern the world has it is time to reclaim our technical leadership on clean energy our economic  leadership in the next great global jobs race and our moral leadership to protect the planet i am confident that this is the foundation upon which a new global climate agreement one that includes all countries doing their fair share w would like to tell him is that in the upper midwest we had a very cool and dry summer i live on a lake during the summer and had you come and visited me i could have posted a picture of the screen of you jumping in my lake and turning blue so i appreciate the world view that the gentleman from massachusetts has got but remember the upper midwest of the united states of america is part of the world as well i would like to delegates hope to replace the flawed kyoto protocol and where are we on the road to copenhagen are we working towards success or are we working as i fear toward a repeat of the kyoto experience after twenty six days of negotiations at three meetings this year in bonn we are in my opinion a long ways from success there are two parallel negotiations underway one under the convention where the u s participates and the other under the kyoto protocol where the u s is an observer the upcoming two week negotiating session in bangkok will start with well over four hundred pages of text to consider this compares with a little over one hundred pages of text countries on a number of thorny issues particularly on funding technology and midterm mitigation targets developing countries are demanding that developed countries contribute up to one percent of their gross domestic product in developing countries for climate change over and above existing foreign aid this would be an additional tab of more than one hundred and forty dollars billion a year for the u s alone this is an unacceptable price tag for the beleaguered american taxpayer and will increase an already out of control federal budget deficit many developing countries have said they will not sign any agreement that does not include massive transfers of wealth these same countries refuse to consider any binding commitments to reduce emissions the developing countries are also leading efforts to weaken or even destroy intellectual property rights by seeking to gain free access to american and other developed countries  ipr for clean energy technologies their proposals include preventing patenting in developing countries requiring compulsory licensing and ensuring access to new technologies on a non exclusive royalty free term all of which ignore the fact that new technologies will only be developed if there are incentives to create them developing countries have also demanded that developed countries reduce their emissions by at least forty percent below  and twenty cuts of such magnitude could only be achieved by wrecking developed countries economies and indeed the global economy in the meantime most developing countries say they are unwilling to undertake any emissions reduction  in the absence of developed country funding or free technology finally it appears that a majority of developed countries including the united states have agreed that developing countries should not have to take on legally binding emissions reductions commitments for the foreseeable future business as usual projections so that even if developed countries reduce their emission to zero global emissions will be higher in two thousand and fifty than they are today because of increases in the developing world as today's witness told the center for american progress in june quote according to recent modeling even if every other country in the world besides china reduced its emissions by eighty percent between now and fifty a thoroughly unrealistic assumption by the way china's emissions would alone be so large to put us on a track of global concentrations far above what scientists consider to be safe un mister stern in light of this will the senate ratify an agreement that lets china india brazil and other major developing economies off the hook indefinitely i have my doubts so what does all of this portend my more than twelve years experience with international climate change negotiations tells me we are heading towards a repeat of kyoto namely an environmentally ineffective agreement that cannot be ratified by the united states senate with so many controversial issues left unresolved mister stern and his negotiating team have eighty seven days of hard work ahead i hope today's hearing helps provide a roadmap for a successful treaty that the american public your weather dialogue here we just finished experiencing the longest period in our community's history portland oregon known for rain without rain this summer entirely consistent with what the experts would tell us in terms of changes in global climate patterns i am very pleased that you have structured this hearing today i hear my good friend from wisconsin  articulate the concerns about nations stated negotiating positions after other work over the course of the last year i am struck by the growing consensus about the shared interests that we all share the opportunities to blend the range of interest to be able to make sure that every country not so much their stated negotiating positions but what is in their long term interests what we can do to fashion an agreement i think is more possible than i would have expected it is clear that the americans can no longer continue to waste more energy than anybody in the world regardless of our concerns about climate change and the negotiations  look forward to hearing from mister stern about how these pieces are coming together what he views as the opportunities for these aligned interests and last but by no means least any observations that he may have about what we in congress and this committee in particular can do between now and december to help move this along in congress and any assistance we may give in copenhagen thank you very much  that you are making on the international stage it is always difficult in our state and has been historically to balance the economic and environmental consideration so i would ask you to and i am certain that you will take that into consideration a state such as mine and they are more heavily impacted than others in this country to the decisions that are going to be made on behalf of the united states in the international community and look just not at the continuing our reports of this summer let me give you mine during my three day summer vacation at lake quinalt washington from the olympic peninsula part of the olympic national park on the south side of lake quinalt there are these incredibly h trees the tallest sitka spruce in the world but on the western ridge of every ridge that is exposed to the winds coming in from the pacific ocean they look like they have been clear cut because there was an enormous windstorm statement about what happens when the climate changes to have to be climbing over these huge trees that have been knocked down i do not know if that windstorm was specifically caused by climate change but it was consistent with what the pattern suggests is going to become more frequent and we are seeing more frequently in the pacific northwest two notes of optimism this summer technology has been advancing which ought to give us more optimism ultimately we have to have technology to solve this last week first solar an american company just sign contract to build the biggest solar electrical generating plant in china using american technology this is a model for the future we will start building lithium ion batteries in this country and electric cars in this country technology should be giving us optimism in listened to members of the u s house and actually took notes i was stunned this has never happened this is a wonderful opportunity for america to lead the world both in washington dc and copenhagen and mister stern we w while i did not have a vacation i had a workation in my district but in tennessee where i am from as i was holding town halls we found the weather was much cooler than average one of my halls that had five times as many people as expected we were too large for the building and found ourselves out on the parking lot the first week of august during the evening and we were perfectly comfortable it was one hundred and three it was more like eighty three degrees so that came a little bit as a pleasant surprise for us and when it was august th and i was slipping a sweater on my fifteen month grandson to go out in the evening i thought my goodness this is the coolest summer that we have had in one hundred and thirteen years we welcome you and we are looking forward to hearing what you have to say i will have to tell you while some of my colleagues favor a global treaty i do not favor a global climate change treaty it is an effort that i am not able to support as i have studied the issue and realizing many third world nations  are beginning to say look we need to be working on a standard of living their people and their leaders are trying to figure out how to deal with immediate life and death issues every single day they are worried about food and health and sustainable economic development and want to place those issues first and foremost before looking at climate issues that would have an effect on them fifty or one hundred years down the road  here in this country intellectual property protections for those innovators are going to be an imperative but looking forward to the discussion today i yield back mister chairman thank you so much mister chairman i thank the gentlelady the chair recognizes the delight because i think that with the united states fully participating and with the united states for the first time putting forth an effort to deal with one of the most difficult issues facing our generation climate change the rest of the world i think will take note pay attention and even begin to participate i think that when you look at information to congress and i think we are on the road to the beginning of the healing of this planet and so i appreciate your leadership and hope that  coordinating the clinton administration's initiative on global climate change mister stern served as the senior white house negotiator at the kyoto in buenos aires negotiations he has now been named by secretary hillary clinton as the department of state's special envoy for climate change mister stern is the nation's chief climate negotiator he represents the united states internationally in all bilateral and multilateral negotiations regarding climate change it is an honor for us to have you with us today mister stern whenever you feel comfortable please begin mister stern thank you very now i do thank you and the ranking member and members of this committee for inviting me here today and let me thank you all for the hard work and leadership that you have shown over the past year this morning i would like to provide you with a brief update on the state of negotiations the core issues remain mitigation undertakings for developed and the more advanced developing countries a regime for measuring reporting and most importantly verifying all actions taken and the provision of appropriate financial technology assistance by major economies as well as issues of adaptation and forestry we are concentrating our efforts on three related fronts the formal negotiating track of the u n framework convention the major economies forum and bilateral discussions let me say bluntly that the tenor of negotiations and the formal u n track has been difficult so far developing countries tend to see a problem not of their own making that they are being asked to fix in ways in which they fear could stifle their own ability to live their standards of living developed countries tend to see an unforgiving problem that cannot be solved without the full participation of key developing countries particularly china and other emerging market economies and yet we must find a way to bridge this historic developed and developing country divide in the major economies forum some good progress has been made the leaders declaration in l'aquila italy included a pledge by developing countries to undertake actions that would significantly cut their emissions in the midterm compared to business as recognition of the broad scientific understanding that the increase in global temperatures ought not to exceed two degrees centigrade as compared to pre industrial levels an agreement that emissions globally must peak as soon as possible and agreement on broad principles of financing related to climate change major developing countries and that includes china brazil india south africa are in fact taking action they recognize the seriousness of the problem their own place in what was fundamentally a domestic policy vacuum it is critical that what we do internationally be synched up to what we are doing domestically that there be political support support here in the congress for the kinds of actions that we are talking about taking internationally so that was vividly not true during the kyoto years it must be true now and that again is one of the reasons why the waxman markey legislation is so fundamentally important second lesson is that we cannot move forward on an agreement which fails to include the major emitting countries in the world whether they are developing or developed the problem is a global problem that cannot begin to be solved without the genuine participation of countries like china and the other first of all the climate change threat is a fundamental threat to the united states as well as to other countries and that is true as a matter of economics national security and the environment all three of those and  the whole world not just the united states but places that can be the recipient of the united states high tech exports is clearly in the interest of this country the chairman if you could it would help if you would talk a little bit about the united states china relationship the issues of clean energy and climate and the bilateral negotiations that have been going on in terms of using without the genuine participation of china we have been intensively engaged with the chinese at various levels bilaterally and in the major economies forum and other places we have made it quite clear to the chinese have to reflect that action in an international context they are going to have to be prepared to have a strong verification regime and the like these are all issues that we discuss with them we are attempting to narrow differences  array of different situations starting with secretary clinton's trip in february they have to see that this is a centrally important issue to the u s china bilateral relationship they care a lot and kyoto have been submitted in the senate as treaties the senate report prior to kyoto stated that in the view of the foreign relations committee any amendment to the convention that adopted emissions target would have to be submitted to the senate  will the administration treat a copenhagen climate deal if one is reached as an article two treaty requiring advice and consent by two thirds of the senate or will the administration say that this is a congressional that is good to hear now the conundrum of course is that developing countries and led by china and india have adamantly objected to increasing role to emissions in china and india coupled with the targets that are being proposed for the developed world and you called this the unforgiving math of accumulating emissions your words not mine appropriate really that there be differences as between what the developed countries are doing and what developing countries are doing with respect to the actual content of actions and i think those are differences that ought to disappear over time but we still recognize that there is some basis mister sensenbrenner the bali agreement which was negotiated by the bush administration did talk about differentiated commitments i guess my question  india following secretary clinton's visit to new delhi at a press conference that she had there certainly was not encouraging that india would sign up for binding commitments so i wish you good luck in hopefully  getting them to realize that they have to jump on board binding commitments if they expect the rest of the world to do that the final piece of questions that i would like to ask you mister stern is as i mentioned in my opening statement developing countries are trying to weaken intellectual property rights i am very concerned that the developing countries have proposed preventing patenting and developing in their countries requiring compulsory licensing ensuring access to new technologies on a non exclusive royalty free term does the administration support any of these positions or will the administration work to make sure that the protection of intellectual property rights which in my opinion is needed to assemble the capital to develop these new technologies be included in a treaty that comes out of copenhagen i think a number of us who had the opportunity to spend a week in china earlier this year came away with the same expression of optimism that you mentioned in terms of the interest of the chinese i think it was conveyed formally and informally that there was great interest in securing an agreement that it was clearly important to them and the notion that there are lots of common interests and i would like to return to that in a moment but before then i would like to just follow up on your response to the initial question about what is different now than the kyoto negotiation you were involved in earlier you mentioned that we did not have the domestic policy vacuum that we have greater structure framework i am pleased that after eight years of the united states being missing in action that we have i think changed that and we are working on the policy framework but i am wondering if other than the legislation that has passed the house if you have other thoughts about changes to that framework like the epa's decision that we will be dealing with carbon kind of cultural infrastructure if you will with respect to where the public is where the business community is where the national security community is and where congress is i think all of those things are quite different and lay the foundation for us to move are there provisions in the house legislation that you see specifically making a difference to bring together domestic and foreign interests to be able to understand mutual benefits so that we are bridging that gap and making it less adversarial despite perfectly predictable negotiating posturing whatever version of the bill comes out of the senate because i do think those are quite important mister blumenauer lastly is there anything additional from your vantage point that you think the house and this committee can do in the interim between now and places like india but also to places like europe the thing that will allow us to get this done if we can get it done is combining the sense of what science requires with the sense of pragmatism and there is often not enough pragmatism in the international arena i mean we can get something done if it is based on something that we all need we cannot get something done if it is based on what we all ideally want there is a difference between what you need and what you want if countries can focus on what their real needs are not on ideology not on old rhetoric if they can be sensitive to what is doable in the united states went to china we were very impressed with their investments in new clean energy technology and we were impressed there were things they were doing we did not know before we went including their renewable energy standards and the like it is clear that they are moving it is clear that they want to looked like there was not two parts of the world the developed world and the developing world there were three parts the developed world the developing world and china which is some sort of third tier in its classification should we think of that in these terms and encourage china to think about themselves in those terms and if so where do they fit in that tier mister stern i have had very much the same reaction driving down the same road that you did congressman i think china is gleaming skyscrapers and very modern looking they still have somewhere between three and four hundred million people more people than live in this country who live on a dollar or two a day they are dirt poor  adequate yet but they are doing a lot i have sometimes said that i think the real competitive issue for us the real competitiveness issue with us is that we might think we will spend the next five years pushing china and then we will spend all the rest has agreed or will agree to a binding target of co emissions we will agree never to exceed per capita per capita the average of industrialized nations emissions they have sort of said will with you we will agree never to emit more than you do we will agree to a binding target of course if they get to that level the planet will be cooked long ago what do we say to that argument and what is it in the bill that came out of the house the per capita emissions of the united states aren't going to decline very significantly over a period of forty years or so if you take this out to tw a bill and we get a conference and the president can sign it and we actually enact legislation which again i think there is nothing more important than that but if that kind of regime gets put in place you are going to have  forth that will be part and parcel of that legislation but in terms of what we are looking for from india now it is very much the same structure as what i said for china they need to articulate a strong robust set of actions that will reduce their emissions significantly from where they would otherwise be from their business as usual they have to reflect those in an international agreement and exactly what the structure of that is it is a very live part of the discussions and negotiations there has got to be a the world is in the throes of the great recession and i think there are some european nations that are already experiencing some relief  has collected nothing and given the state of economics around the globe is there a concern on your are asked to provide money for this and we run into problems at home does that create cause for china and india to become even gets us in the right direction with respect to the need on the other side again i think that the provisions that are in the waxman markey bill are really quite helpful in that regard because they do generate some funds not vast away from copenhagen so i think it would be important to either close the senate down or somehow get them to do something they do not like to do which is vote on  standards for our country how do individual complementary policies like that included in the legislation play a role in global mister stern play a role chairman what role would provisions like that adopted by the united states play in international negotiations on the responsibility of countries around the world to adopt similar provisions  think it is useful in that regard verification to work is going to have to balance rigor with not being overly intrusive because countries like us and other countries will have concerns about the degree to which  go about effectively measuring emissions that's one piece of it the verification piece also has to do with the degree to which if countries as we are going to do x y and z they can demonstrate that they are actually doing  part of that and i think it will be tricky but i think it is very important the chairman it is important very important so for example if we were looking at the steel sector in china in the united states  and we wanted to make sure that that sector was properly verified would an agreement be reached as part of this ultimate treaty that would put in place a verification system that would whether it is accurate includes a twenty percent cut in their energy intensity i think that that is something that is actually economy wide it is not a cap in the same way that we are talking about but it is significant i think that  like i mean on the one hand it is significant and doing a fair amount on the other hand they are growing so fast that their emissions are still going up a lot they need to do a set of policies that add up to a national reduction cook the math in their favor the chinese economy is recovering from the worldwide recession faster than ours maybe that is because their stimulus package was more effective than the ones that we have employed  but the projection that i have heard is that the chinese gdp will go up by about fifty percent from two thousand and five to two thousand and ten now a twenty percent cut in energy intensity means that they still emit thirty percent more in emissions and that certainly is not going to have the economic impact that the caps in the waxman markey bill are going to impose on the united states and the byrd hagel resolution basically said the center wouldn't ratify a treaty unless it met two points one is that it was worldwide in application and secondly that it didn't hurt the united states economy and if we are reducing our emissions below where we are now and china is still allowed to increase its emissions by thirty percent i just can see more wealth and more jobs being outsourced from the united states to have that what we have to keep our eye on is again the robustness of the chinese program i think in the right circumstances and we don't know what we have got yet but in the right circumstances would like to see is a set of actions where they are reducing emissions compared to their business as usual path which is at least in some broad way comparable to or in the range of comparability concerns about our own companies is that the legislation that was passed out of the house includes a good deal of protection for energy intensive trade exposed industries basically getting  cutting back on the growth rate of their emissions so that they will be still be thirty percent above two thousand and five levels whereas waxman markey says that we have to reduce our emissions to seventeen percent below a lower baseline and that math just doesn't add up and i think that my constituents and the senate ultimately will have to view whether the deal is a good one for the united states and is in our national interest and china going up thirty percent and us going down seventeen percent with different baselines in my opinion flunks the good deal test by a long long way so i just urge you that you are going to have to figure out a way to figure out to the major developing countries a very important issue is one actually which is referenced in the leader's declaration from the major economies forum although not with the year specified yet emissions are going to have to peak they are not going to peak next year for china they are just not i mean you can't take an economy that is growing like that and put the brakes on flat i mean if you look at what the trajectory is for china it slows they peak and then they start coming down and what that time is is going to be an important part of the discussion chair recognizes the gentleman from washington state mister inslee i almost think before we have a senate debate in a treaty everybody has to watch slumdog millionaire to just get a sense of what we are dealing with with some of our fellow fellow folks across the water i want to just ask what is if you had two scenarios which one would be better for the united states one scenario where india let us say those people who are now living with a piece of plastic stretched over their head on a piece of bamboo and maybe one shirt to their name and they wake up in the morning and try to figure out where they are going to get water when you talk to those people that is what they say what is the first thing you do when you wake up they say i try to find some water to drink then maybe i try to find some food to eat and there are three hundred to five hundred million of those people that live that way now we are asking them they need to act but the question is what so here are two scenarios one scenario where those folks agree to a cap of the same cap that we have in the united states per person they agree with us they will never emit more than we will today and they will agree to be bound by waxman markey in a sense but of course the emissions go up by a factor of ten per person if they did that they would still agree to a cap but it wouldn't do us any good or a situation where we demand and receive vigorous investments by them vigorous changes in their regulatory structure vigorous changes in their transportation infrastructure vigorous efficiency standards in their building some of which some of them have done of those two scenarios my view would be an agreement where we win agreements by the developing world to take action including china as opposed to a cap which might be so high that they never actually ever do anything until the world is already destroyed i will talk the action rather than the cap what are your thoughts on that  agree congressman and that is very much consistent with with our focus all through this year it is consistent with the focus in our submission it is consistent with the focus of what we are going to be discussing in the major economies forum next week here in washington briefing mister stern we appreciate it very much what i would like to do is give you a couple of minutes if you would like to summarize your case here to the congress what you think that we should do and what your expectations are for copenhagen  look i think that the most important thing without a doubt for the congress to do is to enact to pass legislation send it to the president that he can sign that puts that  parties and that includes the europeans the noneu developed countries like japan and australia canada others the major developing countries like china india brazil south africa and then the kind of rank and file if you will of developing countries we need to make a case that and i think that increasingly countries see this that this is an absolutely critical priority for the world that there are security economic and environmental consequences of not acting that are just not acceptable i mean the status quo is not sustainable and we have a moment here where we can make real progress  so we have to get our own house in order as a priority and we have to work with our developed country friends and then developing to to frame out a system that people can all agree on i think it should be built on countries committing to a set of their own national actions i mean that is what we have been talking about from the beginning and that is what we think is most effective it has got to have that it has got to have a verification system and there has got to be a reasonable and balanced system for supporting the through financing and technology poor countries around the world it is also important i think  and we have been doing this but we are going to redouble our efforts to make sure that the broad range of developing countries not the big ones they are in a different place they don't actually we are not looking for them to to be able to proceed technology development is going to be a huge part of that but we have to we are going to need to move forward with all of these groups and we are going to be trying to do that at all levels there are a number of important to do our best to get this done the chairman it was a real privilege to have you come before us today we wish you the best of luck we will do our best from our side to work with the senate in order to complete the legislation so that you can go fully armed into these negotiations the next ninety days are critical and we very much thank you for your work on behalf of our country and the world thank you