It is nine years since nations from all around the world met in Rio to attend the Earth summit.  At this conference it was agreed to voluntarily reduce green house gas emissions to  1990 levels by the year 2000. Due to the Rio agreement not being legally binding and many nations did not meet this goal as they felt it could cause great economic damage by doing so.

In an attempt to encourage countries to commit to reducing green house gas emissions representatives from all around the world met once more in December 1997at a new conference held in Kyoto to sign a revised agreement.  At this time the incumbent clinton administration negotiators agreed to legally binding, internationally enforceable limits of greenhouse gases being an integral part of the treaty.

Clintons stance on this issue is based on the premise that global warming is a real problem and it is due to the activity of man.  Secondly,  This decision shows that the clinton administration believe that the potential damage that can be caused by global warming is of a greater magnitude than the damage that may be caused by the economy by cuttng energy usage.  Thirdly the administration had assumed that this agreement will definitely help to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases.  At present these premises are still much under debate.