Across the country, activists with ties to the Tea Party are railing against all sorts of local and state efforts to control sprawl and conserve energy. They brand government action for things like expanding public transportation routes and preserving open space as part of a United Nations-led conspiracy to deny property rights and herd citizens toward cities.

Many are suspicious of environmental initiatives. Ed Elswick, a county supervisor, voiced criticism at last month's meeting.

Jorhat, Feb. 3: The National Aeronautics and Space Administration will help the tea industry study the impact of climate change on tea bushes. The additional vice-chairman of Tea Research Association, Prabhat Bezboruah, said the recently formed working group on global climate change would take help from Nasa to study climate change and its impact on tea bushes.

India, Russia and China may consider imposing over-flight charges on European airlines, if the European Union (EU) continues with its plans of imposing a carbon tax on international airlines operating to the EU. The tax came into force from January 1.

A clearer picture is likely to emerge after an international conference in Moscow scheduled to begin on February 21. An inter-ministerial delegation drawn from the Ministries of External Affairs and Civil Aviation will attend the meet.

The Minister for Environment and Forests, Ms Jayanthi Natarajan, made it clear on Friday that India would put pressure on richer nations to shoulder a larger burden of the climate change responsibility at the Rio meet in June.

She said the principle of “equity” for cutting greenhouse gas emissions should be the “bottomline” of negotiations on climate change. She was addressing a session in the ongoing Delhi Sustainable Development Summit.

World leaders are meeting in Rio de Janeiro in June for the United Nations Conference on sustainable development, known as Rio+20.

India and France should collaborate to evolve acceptable solutions for the emission reduction regime to be adopted in 2015
am participating in the Delhi Sustainable Development Summit (DSDS) following the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Durban for pursuing the work that had enabled the adoption of a key agreement in December 2011. This agreement on climate change is first and foremost an extremely encouraging sign aiming at an effective multilateral regime for reducing global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. We cannot but rejoice at having reached such a compromise.

The European Union has made clear that while it would not consider putting on hold the inclusion of the aviation sector in its Emission Trading Scheme, it was willing to consider whether India's efforts to reduce carbon emissions could qualify for waivers. Likewise, the EU stressed that while it would push for a legally binding international climate agreement to which all countries are equally accountable, it is not asking developing countries like India to take on absolute emission reduction targets.

NEW DELHI: The EU wants countries meeting at a conference in June under the UN's Rio+20 mechanism to double their share of renewable energy by 2030 under an international obligation. It also wants countries like India to agree to double its energy efficiency levels under an international understanding.

Following meetings with both minister for aviation Ajit Singh and environment minister Jayanti Natarajan on the controversial carbon emissions levy that EU has introduced, Connie Hedegaard, European Union climate action commissioner, claimed the tax is inevitable “as aviation is increasing and emissions from aviation are also increasing.”

India, along with the international community, led by International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICOU), has fiercely opposed the tax introduced from January 1 with airlines accusing the EU of having taken an extra territorial decision.

In the run-up to the Rio+20 Earth Summit, India continues to emphasise the principle of equity as forming the foundation for climate change negotiations.

“I would like to reiterate that the bottom line remains equity,” said minister of environment Jayanthi Natarajan addressing a special session on Biodiversity at the 12th Delhi Sustainable Development Summit. Ms Natarajan’s statement came a day after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had endorsed her stand at the UNFCCC meet at Durban conference