Slower economy saps climate action

By Alister Doyle

OSLO (Reuters) - An economic slowdown is sapping enthusiasm for a costly drive to fight climate change but persistently high oil prices are a lifeline for a "green revolution" of renewable energy technology, experts say.

U.N. talks on a new climate treaty to be agreed in Copenhagen at the end of 2009 resume in Ghana from August 21-27 -- overshadowed by worries about flagging growth and in an atmosphere soured by the collapse of world trade talks.

Weaker growth "will probably reduce the intensity of the negotiations," said Cameron Hepburn, an Australian environmental economist at Oxford University.

"But ought it to? The answer is a fairly clear 'No'."

Many climate experts say the cost of measures to curb greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels would be far less than the long-term damage of inaction -- more heatwaves, rising sea levels, disruptions to food output from droughts in some areas and floods in others.

"The green revolution is going to come anyway," said Denmark's Climate and Energy Minister Connie Hedegaard, the host of the planned U.N. meeting in December 2009 to agree a new U.N. pact, when asked about the impact of the economic slowdown.

And a drive to diversify away from oil unites everyone from left-wing green activists to the United States, alone among industrial nations in opposing the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol capping greenhouse gas emissions in a first phase to 2012.

"We want to lessen our dependence on oil," said Paula Dobriansky, the U.S. Under Secretary of State who leads Washington's climate negotiations, when asked if economic woes would affect U.S. willingness to fight climate change.