COP 15

If a new international climate treaty is to unleash a worldwide "cleantech" explosion, then countries must go far beyond carbon trading and spotlight the role of technologies in cutting climate change pollution, according to a new analysis.

"There should be an emphasis on the role of technology in reducing carbon emissions and allowing the planet to do more with less," the Cleantech Group writes in an analysis explaining why the Copenhagen climate talks won't drive cleantech for now.

"Carbon trading will help, but the challenge of climate mitigation or adaption goes far beyond regulating the industrial emissions that carbon trading is largely aimed at."

Cleantech refers to the use of technology to boost energy efficiency while slashing costs and consumption. The sector represents "the largest investment opportunity on the planet," said Dallas Kachan, managing director of the Cleantech Group. But the world as a whole hasn't even begun to tap it in the way it should.

The absence of cleantech attention in UN climate negotiations is "a legacy" of them "having traditionally been focused on emissions reduction," Kachan told SolveClimate.

For a "truly meaningful" international climate accord, things must change.

Reporting from Barcelona, Spain

A new global warming pact coming out of Copenhagen in December must be a legally enforceable treaty, not just promises from politicians, developing nations said at the Barcelona talks on Wednesday.

The statement was in response to rich nations' newest push for a "politically binding" deal, the idea being it's way too late to get a legal one on the books by December.

Political agreements "are worth very little," said Lumumba Stanislaus Di-Aping (above), the Sudanese chair of the Group of 77 and China.

"Tell me of any politician who delivered on his political manifesto?"

Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen started the firestorm on Monday when he said, "We are working very strongly to reach a politically binding agreement in Copenhagen." Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt added to that on Wednesday, stating on Swedish Radio that a legal treaty is "simply not possible to deliver."