Leading Science Academies Call for Sequestration, Sharp CO2 Cuts

The science academies of the world’s 13 major economic powers have called for a 50 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and for the urgent development of technology to store carbon dioxide from coal-burning power plants underground.

In advance of next month’s meeting of the leaders of the Group of 8 industrialized nations, the science academies from the G8 countries joined scientists from China, India, and other developing nations in the plea to sharply step up efforts to curtail emissions. In addition to increasing the energy efficiency in the transportation and building sectors, the science academies said that by next year the G8 countries should devise plans to build demonstration projects to sequester carbon underground. The academies, which include the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said the development of sequestration technology is a top priority because coal will remain a major source of electricity for the next 50 years. Without sequestration, said Martin Rees, president of the British Royal Society, mass burning of coal could trigger “dangerous and irreversible change in the climate.”