Japan's Goals on Pollutants Draw Criticism

TOKYO, Oct. 6—Japan, which is hosting a major conference on the environment in December, announced today that it will seek a 5 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by industrial countries and will not try to include developing nations in a treaty aimed at making the cutbacks compulsory.

The Japanese stand provoked an immediate outcry from environmental groups and the European Union, which decried Tokyo's goals as too modest. The Japanese announcement also ran counter to some sentiment within the Clinton administration, which is seeking a commitment for emissions reductions in the Third World -- but which agrees that a European suggestion for a 15 percent reduction in industrialized countries is too stiff.

The result was a swirl of discord and uncertainty around plans for the Dec. 1-10 conference in Kyoto, called to unite the world behind efforts to bring down the level of carbon dioxide from cars, power plants and factories that scientists have blamed for global warming and other dangerous changes in Earth's climate.

In their role as organizers, Japanese officials called on the United States, the European Union and other industrial nations to shoulder the burden of reducing the gases rather than imposing restrictions on poorer countries -- such as China, Mexico and Brazil -- whose economies are not as developed. Because the United States is the only nation insisting on some kind of promise from developing nations as well, it has set up a showdown with European and Asian nations that could bring the conference to an end without agreement.

"The discussions are in danger of breaking down over the question of what developing countries need to do," Andrew Kerr, an official of the World Wide Fund for Nature, told reporters in Tokyo.

An American official here who is involved in preparations for the conference and who asked that he not be identified said that the United States is not looking to torpedo the conference but feels that the developing nations must play some role. "We don't expect the developing countries to act at the same level, but we expect them to do something," he said.

Japan's plan calls for the industrial countries to agree to cut carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases by an average of 5 percent from 1990 levels by 2012. But Japan is also proposing a flexible plan that would allow individual countries to set other targets, according to a formula based on gross domestic product, gas emissions per capita or population growth.

That means, according to the Japanese government, that Japan, the United States and other countries would have to reduce emissions by only about 2.5 percent over the next 15 years.

Leading environmentalists immediately blasted the plan and described it as so watered down that it diminishes any chance that a meaningful global agreement will be reached in Kyoto. Greenpeace Japan said that the proposal calls into question whether Japan deserves to be the conference host. A network of 200 Japanese environmental groups, known as Kiko, said the plan amounts to "leading the world to a failure."

The European Union has proposed a 15 percent cut from 1990 emissions levels by 2010 and immediately savaged Japan's proposals, saying they are far too soft. "This is not nearly ambitious enough," EU spokesman Peter Jorgensen said in Brussels.

Jorgensen said that Japan, as host of the conference, ought to be taking a lead role in pushing for strict emissions reductions. "They will have to assume the necessary political initiative," he declared.

Japanese officials defended their proposal as "fair and realistic," saying that after the oil shortages of the 1970s, Japan spent two decades and massive resources to improve its energy efficiency and reduce emissions. Achieving a 5 percent reduction now, on top of efficiencies already made, would require that Japan build at least 20 new nuclear power plants, one official said.

The Japanese government's position highlighted the divisions here and in other industrialized nations between business leaders who oppose the new regulations and environmentalists who favor them. It also indicated how difficult it will be for the more than 150 nations coming to the Kyoto conference to agree, in the two months remaining, on how to combat global warming.

The Clinton administration is still in the throes of deciding what positions it will take, balancing the desire to reduce greenhouse gases against fears that new antipollution regulations on industry could hurt the U.S. economy. U.S. officials say the American position will be outlined later this month and will call for developing nations to be included in any treaty. The U.S. Senate has adopted a unanimous resolution that the United States should not sign a climate treaty if developing countries, some of them heavy polluters, are not required to comply.

A coalition of American automakers and other industrial companies has launched a media campaign against the treaty. Part of its argument is that exempting developing countries would drive jobs and factories in the United States to nations where expensive emissions controls are not required.

Automakers also have told President Clinton that such proposals as higher gasoline taxes or tighter fuel economy requirements on new vehicles would be disastrous for the American economy. Automobile exhaust has been cited as a key source of gases that contribute to global warming.

Clinton has launched his own media blitz on the issue, lobbying American weather forecasters and hosting a climate-change conference at Georgetown University. The United States accounts for 22 percent of the world's carbon dioxide emissions, far more than any other nation, and Clinton is trying to build grass-roots awareness of the problem.

China had no immediate reaction to Japan's proposal but has been vehement in its opposition to its inclusion in the treaty. The Beijing government says it is not fair to hold a country that is struggling to get on its feet to the same standard as those that for decades have developed their industries unhindered by costly regulations.

Sugandhy, an assistant minister in the Indonesian Ministry of Environment, said in a telephone interview from Jakarta that Indonesia supports efforts to reduce global warming but opposes being included in any legally binding targets for emissions reductions.