THE national science academies of all the G8 countries issued an unprecedented challenge to their governments yesterday, urging immediate action to curb greenhouse gas emissions to fight global warming.

Scientific evidence about the causes and impacts of climate change is now so clear that effective measures to address them can no longer be delayed, the elite institutions said.

The call for firm steps to be agreed at the Gleneagles summit next month puts further pressure on President Bush to sign up to binding emissions controls, particularly as his own country’s National Academy of Science (NAS) is among the signatories.

The strongly-worded statement was also endorsed by the government-sponsored research academies of China, India and Brazil, offering the strongest indications yet that major developing countries are serious about reducing their own contributions to global warming.

A lack of targets for the developing world was one of the key objections cited by the Bush Administration when it withdrew from the Kyoto Protocol on climate change in 2001.

The academies also reject another important American argument: that the science of climate change is not yet sufficiently certain to justify action. “The scientific understanding of climate change is now sufficiently clear to justify prompt action,” the statement said. “It is vital that all nations identify cost-effective steps that they can take now, to contribute to substantial and long-term reduction in net global greenhouse gas emissions.”

While it accepted that climate science will always carry an element of uncertainty, it said: “A lack of full scientific certainty about some aspects of climate change is not a reason for delaying an immediate response that will, at a reasonable cost, prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.”

The agreement of the Russian Academy of Sciences is also significant, as its members, who have previously been more sceptical of the science of global warming than the other institutions, last year advised President Putin not to ratify the Kyoto treaty.

Lord May of Oxford, President of the Royal Society, attacked the US position on global warming as “misguided”, pointing out that Mr Bush had repeatedly overruled his own scientists’ advice. “President Bush has an opportunity at Gleneagles to signal that his Administration will no longer ignore the scientific evidence and act to cut emissions,” he said. “It is clear that world leaders, including the G8, can no longer use uncertainty about aspects of climate change as an excuse for not taking urgent action to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

“Significantly, along with the science academies of the G8 nations, this statement’s signatories include Brazil, China and India who are among the largest emitters of greenhouse gases in the developing world.”

Tony Blair has pledged to use Britain’s G8 presidency to make climate change a priority at the summit. While US participation in the Kyoto accord remains unlikely, the Prime Minister remains hopeful that President Bush might agree to long-term emissions controls if countries such as China and India also sign up.

The Kyoto Protocol, which was signed in 2000, demands an average 5.2 per cent cut in emissions by 2010 from developed nations, taking 1990 figures as a baseline. Developing countries were explicitly excluded from any targets, as the industrialised world has made by far the largest historical contribution to greenhouse gases.

US objections to this predate the Bush Administration — in 1999, the Senate voted 95-0 to reject any global warming treaty that did not include developing countries and had the potential to harm the American economy. Its position has hardened since Mr Bush’s election, particularly in the light of industrial competition from countries such as China and India.

The US is also more heavily reliant than European countries on coal, which generates more greenhouse gases than natural gas or oil, and its geography and culture of car use mean that substantial emissions cuts would have a more marked effect on society.

Environmental groups welcomed the statement, although Catherine Pearce, of Friends of the Earth, said: “This document lacks targets or a timetable for urgent action.”

WHERE THEY STAND ON CLIMATE CHANGE

WHAT BLAIR WANTS

• A new round of post-Kyoto talks involving the US, Russia, China and India
• A way forward using greater investment in fuel technology from the US which could, for example, transform emission levels from coal-burning power stations, currently being opened at the rate of one a week in China
• The US to rethink its opposition to the Kyoto Protocol, which called for a cut in emissions of at least 5 per cent below 1990 levels
• Reductions in emissions: China emits 2,893 million metric tons of CO2 per year (2.3 tons per capita), the second largest polluting country; the US emits 5,410 million (20.1 tons per capita); the EU 3,171 million (8.5 tons per capita

  THE ACADEMIES’ EVIDENCE

• Carbon dioxide levels have risen from 280 parts per million in 1750 to over 375ppm today — higher than any level measured in the past 420,000 years
• The Earth’s surface warmed by approximately 0.6C (1.1F) in the 20th century
• The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projects a global temperature increase of between 1.4C (2.5F) and 5.8C (10.4F) between 1990 and 2100
• The IPCC projects an increase in average sea level of between 0.1 and 0.9 metres between 1990 and 2100. A 0.5m rise in Bangladesh alone would place 6 million people at risk of flooding
• 1994 to 2003 was the hottest decade in Europe in more than 500 years
• Britain’s target is a 12.5% reduction in gas emissions on 1990 levels, by 2010
• The signatories: Academia Brasiliera de Ciências (Brazil) Royal Society of Canada Chinese Academy of Sciences, Academié des Sciences (France) Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina (Germany) Indian National Science Academy Accademia dei Lincei (Italy) Science Council of Japan Russian Academy of Sciences Royal Society (UK) National Academy of Sciences (USA)

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