No Favours on Climate Change, Says Bush

George Bush will today warn that he will not make concessions on climate change in return for Tony Blair's staunch support over Iraq.

In an interview with ITV's Tonight With Trevor McDonald programme, to be screened this evening, Mr Bush will rule out committing the US to a Kyoto-style binding agreement on greenhouse gases.

However, the US president also showed signs that he was coming into line with global scientific opinion on climate change, describing the issue as "a significant, long-term issue that we've got to deal with".

He also acknowledged that human activity was "to some extent" to blame for global warming, but made it clear he regards new technology as the key to halting it.

He indicated that he believed Mr Blair was also ready to "move beyond the Kyoto agenda" and focus on techniques such as the sequestration of carbon dioxide in underground wells rather than on a regime of limiting emissions.

When asked whether he would make a special effort to help the prime minister at the summit - which begins on Wednesday - in return for his support over Iraq, Mr Bush said: "I really don't view our relationship as one of quid pro quo.

"Tony Blair made decisions on what he thought was best for keeping the peace and winning the war on terror, as I did. So I go to the G8 not really trying to make him look bad or good, but I go to the G8 with an agenda that I think is best for our country."

He made it clear he was not ready to sign up to an agreement to reduce carbon emissions, saying: "If this looks like Kyoto, the answer is no. The Kyoto treaty would have wrecked our economy, if I can be blunt."

Instead, he said, he wanted to talk to his fellow G8 leaders about developing new technologies to limit climate change without reducing the availability of energy to individuals and businesses.

He highlighted his administration's £11.3bn investment in developing technologies such as hydrogen-powered cars, zero emission power stations and carbon sequestration, and said: "I think you can grow your economy and at the same time do a better job of harnessing greenhouse gases."

Environmental activists immediately voiced dismay at Mr Bush's comments, which they said could block any progress on climate change at Gleneagles.

They urged the leaders of the other seven G8 countries to sign a communique excluding the US rather than accept a watered-down statement that avoided calling for cuts in CO2 emissions.

However, the environment secretary, Margaret Beckett, said she was reluctant to try to interpret the president's words. "I think it's been clear for some days that negotiations were likely to go to down to the wire, and that appears still to be the case," she told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

"What we wanted, and what we do still want, is to try to end up going in the same direction ... that wherever people come from there is a recognition about the urgency of the problem and there is agreement."

Mr Bush's remarks will be broadcast as thousands of protestors continue a week of demonstrations in Edinburgh and around Scotland intended to put pressure on the G8 leaders. There were fears of violence around an anti-capitalist demonstration planned for Edinburgh city centre.

He shrugged off campaigners' claims that his decision to double US development aid to Africa by 2010 was too little, too late.

The US gives 0.2% of its GDP in overseas aid - well below the UN's 0.7% target, which EU states are committed to reaching in the next few years, but Mr Bush insisted the US was "leading the world when it comes to helping Africa".

He expressed readiness to abandon farm subsidies which make it difficult for African economies to compete - but only if the EU was also prepared to scrap its common agricultural policy.

"We've got agricultural subsidies, but not nearly to the extent that our friends in the EU have," he said. "And so the position of the US government is that we're willing to do so and we will do so with our fine friends in the European Union."