Even as newspaper headlines and Web sites paint an ever-gloomier picture of global climate change, New Mexico and its partners in the Western Climate Initiative — six other states and three Canadian provinces — are in Salt Lake City this week to fine-tune their attack on global warming.



It will take several years before the reduction measures take effect, but the partners’ goal is to reduce the region’s greenhouse gas emissions to 15 percent below 2005 levels over by 2020. That, in turn, is required to meet the widely held international goal of cutting carbon dioxide emissions 50 to 85 percent by 2050.



Originally, New Mexico and five partners formed the Western Climate Initiative in 2007. "We’re moving on this because the feds haven’t," said Sarah Cottrell, environmental adviser to Gov. Bill Richardson.



The group has since expanded to include 10 governments in the United States and Canada. Six other states have signed on as official observers of the process, as have six states in northern Mexico and two other Canadian provinces.



This week in Salt Lake City, members will discuss the first draft of a large and complex plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions on a regional basis — whether or not the U.S. government has its own program, Cottrell said. "We’re not waiting until they pass something," she said.



The draft plan calls for a form of carbon-emission cutbacks known as cap and trade. In general terms, it would set carbon-emission limits from all the major sources, such as transportation fuels and power plants, and then auction credits for each ton of carbon emissions. Those credits could be bought and sold. Keeping track of the gas emissions would fall to a new nonprofit agency, The Climate Registry.



The final plan for a regional cap-and-trade program is scheduled for release in early September. But Cottrell said it will likely take several years to put the plan into effect. Among the huge tasks ahead are to identify all the carbon-emission sources to include in the program, determine how much carbon each one currently emits, and then agree on how to allocate the emission allowances.