World wants tough 2050 climate cuts, split on path

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Governments broadly support tough 2050 goals for cuts in greenhouse gas emissions but are split on how to share out the reductions, according to a new guide to negotiators of a new U.N. climate pact. A document to be presented to U.N. climate talks in Bonn from March 29-April 8 narrows down a list of ideas for fighting global warming in a new treaty due to be agreed in December to about 30 pages from 120 in a text late last year.

OSLO (Reuters) - Governments broadly support tough 2050 goals for cuts in greenhouse gas emissions but are split on how to share out the reductions, according to a new guide to negotiators of a new U.N. climate pact.

A document to be presented to U.N. climate talks in Bonn from March 29-April 8 narrows down a list of ideas for fighting global warming in a new treaty due to be agreed in December to about 30 pages from 120 in a text late last year.

"It shows that there's an awful lot still to be done. And it also shows what needs to be done," Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, told Reuters on Monday of the text by Michael Zammit Cutajar, chairman of a U.N. negotiating group.

"It's a good leg-up to a much more precise agenda focusing on filling in the gaps," de Boer said.

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More than 190 governments agreed in 2007 to work out a climate treaty by the end of 2009 after warnings from the U.N. Climate Panel that greenhouse gases, from burning fossil fuels, would bring more droughts, floods, heatwaves and rising seas.

"There is broad support by parties for a science-based indicative goal for the reduction of greenhouse gases to the middle of the century," the text says.

Possible goals include halving greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, deep cuts to limit a rise in temperatures by 1.5 or 2.0 degrees Celsius (2.7-3.6 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels, or setting a low personal emissions quota for everyone.

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