ROSTOCK, Germany - Both President Bush and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have shown optimism about reaching agreement on climate change, but leaders gathered here Wednesday are farther apart then they like to acknowledge.

German police search vehicles and people in the area, as part of a heightened security screen for the upcoming G8 Summit in Kuhlungsborn, Wednesday June 6, 2007.[AP]

The gap between the United States and other industrialized was underscored Wednesday by Bush's top environmental advisor. The president and Merkel are due to hash out some of their nations' differences over lunch later in the day, ahead of the evening's official opening of the three-day Group of Eight summit of industrialized nations.

Germany, as summit host, is pushing specific targets for reduction of the carbon emissions believed to cause global warming. Merkel has made the issue the centerpiece of her G-8 leadership.

Her proposal is for a "two-degree" target, under which global temperatures would be allowed to increase no more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, (2 degrees Celsius) before being brought back down. Practically, experts have said that means a global reduction in emissions of 50 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. Merkel supports a global carbon-trading market as one tool.

Jim Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, again rejected that approach Wednesday. He called it significant that the summit leaders would merely agree to keep talking about the issue.

"We've not sat down with China, India, Brazil, Mexico, South Africa," he said. "We have not sat down with Australia, South Korea and a number of the other major emitting countries on this issue. And so until we've got everyone in the room and until we have consensus among all of them you won't see a collectively stated goal on that yet."

But, he added: "It's coming."

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Bush, Merkel far apart on climate change(Over)
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