Leading article: The elephant in the room at the world climate talks

On the agenda is new technology to lower the increase in the carbon emissions that boost global warming. That is a good thing. It is important to debate whether "low-carbon energy" means clean coal or more radical renewables like wind and solar power - and how these technologies can be transferred to poorer countries. But there will be an elephant in the room. The crucial issue of capping the planet's current emissions will not be discussed.

It is not hard to see why. As Tony Blair acknowledged at the weekend, American opposition to carbon caps is deep-rooted and predates George Bush; the Senate voted 95-0 against Kyoto when Bill Clinton was President. And the economic growth of China and India will be powered by cheap coal - China opens a new power station almost every week - because, to emerging economies, globalisation is more important than global warming. Climate change was not mentioned once by China's political leaders when it took over the presidency of the G20 recently.

No action on global warming will work unless the US, the European Union, Russia, Japan, China and India work together. But bombarding them with the ever-increasing scientific evidence on global warming has been tried without success. The weather has wagged its finger with far greater political force. Thanks no doubt to hurricanes, US states and mayoralties and industry are talking about emissions targets. In the end it will be domestic political pressure, not international preaching, that moves Washington. The same is true of China and India, where worries about air quality are growing, as is the realisation that ignoring the environment may be bad for marketing their products around the world. In this context, today's talks create important mood music. They are all round the same table - even the United States - and talking.

That is not enough. Britain needs to set a better example. A report published this week by the Institute for Public Policy Research shows that UK carbon emissions have risen in the past two years and are now only four per cent below the 1990 level. Labour's manifesto promised to cut these to 20 per cent below, by 2010. To do that Mr Blair's forthcoming Climate Change Programme Review should increase road tax for gas- guzzler cars, introduce council tax rebates to encourage greater home insulation, and more tightly cap emissions from UK industry in the second phase of the EU's new carbon trading scheme.

At present, that review is not due out before year's end. It should be brought forward and published before those nations which signed the Kyoto Protocol gather in Montreal in December to look at what happens when Kyoto runs out in 2012. Mr Blair also needs to press for changes at the World Bank. The Gleneagles agreement saw the Bank as a leader in spreading renewable energy projects worldwide. Yet, Friends of the Earth revealed yesterday, the Bank, far from pressing ahead, is failing to meet existing targets. Just 9 per cent of all its energy funds go to renewable or energy efficiency projects.

It was brave of Mr Blair to put climate change, together with Africa, at the top of his G8 agenda, for it was always going to be hard to deliver. A good political kicking may be the inevitable outcome. Yet there is still a lot he can do to avoid that.