U.S. Pressure Weakens G-8 Climate Plan

"The administration is pursuing a dangerous 'ostrich' policy: put your head in the sand and pretend nothing's happening," Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) said in an interview.

Some advocates are urging the seven other G-8 members to adopt their own global warming plan rather than accept a milder statement that they say would provide the Bush administration with political cover.

"The U.S. will just not budge," said Hans J.H. Verolme, director of the World Wildlife Fund's U.S. climate change program. "We'd rather not have a deal than have a deal that lets George Bush off the hook."

Bush's top science adviser, John Marburger, said he is "impatient and frustrated" with such charges, because the administration is seeking to reduce carbon dioxide emissions through technological advances and other voluntary measures.

"From the beginning, this administration has acknowledged the Earth is getting warmer and we're going to have to take responsibility for our emissions," Marburger said. Critics claim the White House believes "climate change is not happening, which is not true."

Several officials involved in the negotiations said none of the document's wording is fixed, and it could change before the leaders adopt a final version for the summit. Connaughton emphasized that the administration's suggested changes address the threat of rising temperatures and offer several proposals to mitigate climate change as well as air pollution.

"We are looking for economy of expression in a leadership text," he said.

The controversy follows recent charges by several climate specialists that Bush appointees are exerting undue political influence on federal global warming documents.

Last week, Rick S. Piltz, a policy expert and former Democratic congressional aide who worked until March in the federal office coordinating climate change, released documents showing that Cooney, the White House official, had edited the office's documents to highlight higher temperature's benefits and uncertainties surrounding global warming. Before joining the administration, Cooney was an oil lobbyist.

In December, the administration issued new guidelines calling for federal officials to have final sign-off on a series of climate change assessment. Several experts objected that the requirement undermines their independence, and senior scientist Eric Sundquist of the U.S. Geological Survey resigned as lead author on one report in protest.

In a May 12 letter from his personal e-mail account, Sundquist said the new rules may make it difficult "to communicate the best independent scientific judgment to decision makers."

NOAA Deputy Administrator James R. Mahoney, who is overseeing the government's 21 periodic climate assessments, said these concerns were unfounded because the government will publish the full reports before political appointees have a chance to alter them.

Researcher Eddy Palanzo contributed to this report.