ABSTRACT
The international response to the global crisis of climate change has reproduced the patterns of advantage and disadvantage that plague the global community of nations. Within the international negotiations to address climate change, the interests of the world's poorer nations and of the environment itself have taken second place to the dominant economic interests of the richer nations and corporations. There are many successful examples around the world of governments promoting renewable energy; in fact a large part of the current world demand for photovoltaics is based on government programs. India's carbon dioxide emissions in 1990 from burning fossil fuels, gas flaring, and cement production for instance was 0.22 tonnes of carbon. The prospects of climate change are forcing the world to reconsider the way its uses fossil-fuel energy to driveits economy and to serve as the basis for the conventional models for economic and social development.
