By Andy Jackson

President Lee Myung-bak will present his plan for a ``voluntary and unilateral" cut in Korea's emission of greenhouse gases later this week at the ongoing climate conference in Copenhagen.

The proposal calls for Korea to reduce its estimated emission of greenhouse gases in 2020 by 30 percent. That would represent a four percent reduction from 2005 levels.

During the Nov. 19 summit between Lee and Barack Obama, the U.S. president said that Korea's announced greenhouse gases reduction goal was ``a model for emerging economies."

That is just the kind of praise the Lee administration wanted to hear, although not in way you might think. While it is always good for the ego to be thought of as ``a model," the music to Lee & company's ears were the words ``emerging economies."

One reason so many countries signed on the 1997 Kyoto Protocol was that it was painless to do so. One hundred fifty of the 187 nations which have ratified the protocol had no restrictions placed on their emissions levels. In fact, many of those nations stood to make a profit in the form of increased financial and technological aid from developed nations.

Korea is one of only two OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) members that are not listed as Annex 1 states that must reduce emission levels of greenhouse gasses to near or below 1990 levels.

The goal for President Lee is to make sure that Korea stays off that list, thus locking in the increased emissions that resulted from Korea's relatively rapid economic growth over the past 17 years.

The United States has its own issues regarding the Kyoto Protocol. Compared to most of the nations targeted for mandatory greenhouse gases cuts by the Kyoto Protocol, the U.S. has experienced relatively robust economic and population growth since 1990, making adhering to mandatory cuts with that year as a benchmark more difficult.

That issue, along with the exclusion of developing nations from limits in the growth of greenhouse gas emissions, made it politically impossible for the U.S. to join the Kyoto Protocol. The U.S. failed to ratify Kyoto under presidents Bill Clinton and George Bush.

President Obama will not even consider having the U.S. ratify Kyoto and has instead pushed for a voluntary pledge of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by about 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020.

Obama's team in Copenhagen is pushing for a ``pledge and review" structure as a substitute for Kyoto's mandates. Such a structure would fit the Lee administration's goal of avoiding an internationally binding mandate to reduce emissions, making the U.S. and Korea (along with China) natural allies against attempts to expand reduction mandates.

The conflicting goals of the various blocs have made it almost all but impossible to have a final deal in place by the time the Copenhagen conference closes, which would likely make pledge and review the default starting point at future climate talks. That is something Seoul and Washington and Beijing could live with.

Even if Korea can manage to stay off the list of Annex 1 nations, sticking to Lee's voluntary pledge will be difficult. Knowledge Economy Minister Choi Kyung-hwan stated that the goal may put too great a burden on Korea's economy, making it lose jobs to China and other competitors.

``Many in the business community still continue to express serious concern that we may lose our competitive edge," Choi told journalists in late November. "Some say the burden would deal a fatal blow to our growth potential. Many businessmen are voicing their concerns that local energy-intensive sectors including steel and petrochemical firms would lose out (to the Chinese)."

(On the other hand, having a stated goal of reducing greenhouse gases also gives Lee a convenient excuse for not reaching his campaign pledge of a seven-percent annual growth in GDP.)

One thing that Korea has going for it in regards to reducing greenhouse gas emissions is its embrace of nuclear power, the one technology that has been proven to reliably provide large amounts of electrical power. Korea already produces 40 percent of its electricity from twenty reactors in the country.

Korea's nuclear program could be even more efficient and environmentally friendly if it could start conducting dry pyroprocessing, a method of recycling spent nuclear material that would allow Korea to reuse 95 percent of its nuclear waste once it becomes fully implemented.

Unfortunately, Korea cannot currently conduct dry pyroprocessing due to a 1992 agreement with North Korea banning activities such as nuclear reprocessing (which has obviously not stopped Pyongyang from doing so) and a 1974 agreement with the United States. Neither agreement can be renegotiated until after the issue of North Korea's nuclear weapons programs is resolved.

Threading that needle would made Copenhagen look easy.

Andy Jackson has taught courses on American government and has been writing on Korean politics and other issues for four years. He is the chairman of Republicans Abroad-Korea. He can be reached at andyinrok@lycos.com.