Leaders of the world's major industrial democracies resolved on Monday to wean their energy-hungry economies off carbon fuels, marking a major step in the battle against global warming that raises the chances of a U.N. climate deal later this year.
The Group of Seven's energy pledge capped a successful summit for host Angela Merkel, who revived her credentials as a "climate chancellor" and strengthened Germany's friendship with the United States at the meeting in a Bavarian resort.
Meeting in the picturesque Schloss Elmau at the foot of Germany's highest mountain, the Zugspitze, the G7 leaders pledged in a communique after their two-day meeting to develop long-term low-carbon strategies and abandon fossil fuels by the end of the century.
"We commit to doing our part to achieve a low-carbon global economy in the long-term, including developing and deploying innovative technologies striving for a transformation of the energy sectors by 2050," the communique read.
The leaders invited other countries to join them in their drive, saying they would accelerate access to renewable energy in Africa and intensify their support for vulnerable countries' own efforts to manage climate change.
The G7 stopped short of agreeing any immediate collective targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions which the Europeans had pressed their partners in the club to embrace. But they said a U.N. climate conference later this year should reach a deal with legal force, including through binding rules, to combat climate change.
Green lobby groups - routinely critical of the advanced economies' record on climate change - welcomed the thrust of the summit commitments.
"Merkel's G7 says 'Auf Wiedersehen' (farewell) to fossil fuels," global activist network Avaaz declared in a statement.
"Elmau delivered", enthused environmental pressure group Greenpeace, adding that "the vision of a 100 percent renewable energy future is starting to take shape."
The G7 leaders supported a reduction in global greenhouse gas emissions within a range recommended by the United Nations climate change panel, and backed a global target for limiting the rise in average global temperatures to 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) compared with pre-industrial levels. Their accord helps set up the U.N. Paris conference, at which some 200 countries will try to reach agreement on limiting the rise in global temperatures to 2 degrees Celsius and seal a new worldwide agreement to curb greenhouse gas emissions. (Reuters)
PHOTO: German Chancellor Angela Merkel and U.S. President Barack Obama arrive with other G7 participants for a family picture at the G7 summit at the Elmau castle in Kruen, Germany, June 8, 2015