The United States and the European Union agreed tighter cooperation on renewable energy, "clean coal" and other environmental policies on Wednesday, despite splits over the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol on global warming, reported Reuters. After a two-day meeting in Finland, which holds the EU's rotating presidency, delegates agreed to a second round in the United States in 2007 to continue dialogue on "climate change, clean energy and sustainable development". "The EU and U.S. delegations agreed to strengthen bilateral cooperation," the two sides said in a joint statement after the meeting, agreed at a summit in Austria in June as part of a drive to combat global warming and other threats. They agreed to promote technologies to capture and bury greenhouse gases from coal, to boost energy efficiency and renewable fuels, to set common standards for biofuels, protect the diversity of species on Earth and help developing nations. However, they side-stepped rifts over the Kyoto Protocol, the U.N. plan for capping emissions of greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels that are widely blamed for global warming. The EU backs Kyoto but President George W. Bush opposes it. "You can have Kyoto and non-Kyoto members working together," said Paula Dobriansky, U.S. under secretary of state for democracy and global affairs. She told a news conference that both sides had "many common goals" in cutting greenhouse gases.
