By: Erika Lovley

Breaking with other environmental groups, Friends of the Earth criticized the climate agenda unveiled by Barack Obama Tuesday, calling it “welcomed” but not aggressive enough.

The majority of environmental groups, though, offered rousting praise for the president-elect’s plan, even though it offered an emission reduction goal significantly lower than what the groups demanded in a recent letter to his transition leaders.

So far, Friends of the Earth is the only one of the nearly 30 signatories to the letter that’s taking on Obama.

His plan calls for emissions to be reduced to 1990 levels by 2020. The greens’ letter wanted emissions a minimum cut of 25 percent below 1990 levels by 2020.

“Obama is demonstrating leadership on global warming from the get-go,” said Friends of the Earth President Brent Blackwelder. “But the enormity of the task at hand requires him to be even more aggressive.”

The World Wildlife Fund, which dispatched one of the praise-only statements, said there’ll be plenty of time to hammer out specific emission targets.

“For years we haven’t had any climate change leadership at a federal level, and today marks a substantial shift,” said the fund’s spokesman, Joe Pouliot. “That alone is a huge improvement. Let’s embrace that.”

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