Nations mull phasing out coal

Twenty countries yesterday launched a coal phase-out initiative at UN climate talks in Bonn where America was under fire for the Donald Trump administration's defence of Earth-warming fossil fuels.

Led by Canada and Britain, the "Powering Past Coal Alliance" commits the nations, cities, and regions to weaning themselves off a commodity that still produces about 40 percent of the world's electricity -- a major contributor to global warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions.

The list includes Angola, Belgium, Finland, France, Italy, the Marshall Islands, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Portugal, and Mexico, as well as the regions of Ontario, Quebec, Washington and Alberta, and the city of Vancouver.

"This is another positive signal of the global momentum away from coal, benefiting the health of the climate, the public and the economy," said Jens Mattias Clausen of Greenpeace.

"But it also puts on notice the governments who lag behind on ending coal, or those who promote it, that the world's dirtiest fossil fuel has no future."

Sweden and Scotland, along with California, Beijing, Berlin and New Delhi, have also said they will phase out coal, but are not part of the alliance.

Later Thursday, an American official will address the penultimate day of the annual climate gathering.

With most countries represented by heads of state or cabinet ministers at a "high-level segment" of the conference, Washington sent an acting assistant secretary of state, Judith Garber.

She will address delegates just three days after White House officials drew the ire of observers and delegates by hosting a sideline event defending the continued use of fossil fuels at a forum dedicated to the pursuit of greener alternatives.

Announcing Garber's participation, the State Department emphasised that the Trump administration's position on the climate-rescue Paris Agreement "remains unchanged", and it would withdraw "as soon as it is eligible to do so, unless the president can identify terms for engagement that are more favourable to American businesses, workers, and taxpayers."

The United States ratified the hard-fought global pact, championed by former president Barack Obama, just two months before Donald Trump, who has called climate change a "hoax", was elected to the White House.

Trump announced in June that America would abandon the pact, but the rules say this cannot happen until November 2020.