Indonesia plans to make ministers from around the world use bicycles to get about at the U.N. talks on climate change in Bali to help offset the event's carbon emissions, an environment ministry official said on Friday. Delegates from nearly 190 countries will gather on the resort island on Monday to launch a concentrated effort to hammer out a new deal to replace the Kyoto Protocol, a pact to curb global warming that expires in 2012.

To help offset an estimated 47,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide expected to be emitted during the 12-day event, the government will clear the conference site of cars and lay on about 200 bikes instead to help people move around the area, Agus Purnomo said. "We want people to leave their cars at the main gate and switch to bicycles," Purnomo, the meeting's executive chairman, told a news conference.

"To prevent people from melting in the sun, we will ask everyone to wear light clothes and short sleeves." Purnomo said the estimated emissions figure included carbon dioxide emitted by flights to and from the island and by the use of electricity to power air conditioners. More than 10,000 people including official delegates, activists and journalists are expected to show up at hundreds of sessions sprawled across the island's Nusa Dua area.

(Por Ad ityani Arga, Reuters, 30/11/2007)