The oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico should have been a call to action for the G-20 leaders meeting in Toronto to take serious and immediate steps toward reducing the world's dependence on fossil fuels and to encourage a more rapid move to clean energy technology and jobs.

While the summit's energy and climate outcome was not as bad as feared, the G-20 leaders bobbled an enormous opportunity to secure a better future for their people and the planet.

There is no way, watching the wrenching images of unemployed fishermen and fouled marshes and beaches in the Gulf of Mexico, for us to consider it rational policy that most developed nations continue to reward oil companies with tax breaks and other subsidies.

Yet the G-20 nations went no further than their September 2009 pledges (to curb subsidies), and made no mention of shifting to a new, clean energy economy.

The failure of the world's richest nations to take greater action also translates into problems in helping the world's least developed nations wean themselves off their fossil fuel diets.

AID STILL GOING TO FOSSIL FUEL PROJECTS

While the G-20 leaders are committed to phasing out national fossil fuel subsidies, their countries' donor contributions to the World Bank and other international development institutions are pushing in the opposite direction, undermining their efforts.

For example, the Environmental Defense Fund has identified 88 coal-fired power plants which received a total of more than $37 billion in such public international financing over a 15-year span - a direct, though often missed, subsidy to the fossil fuel energy sector, contributing about 791 million tons of CO2 emissions per year.

And just recently, the World Bank approved a $3.75 billion loan to South African national utility Eskom for a 4,800 megawatt coal-fired power plant, instead of shifting its lending portfolio away from subsidizing carbon-intensive energy production.

At least the G-20 did not, contrary to a pre-summit leaked draft, back-track on fossil fuel subsidies language in its final communique, which commits nations to phase out "inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption" and to continue tracking and reporting commitments in upcoming G-20 summits.

It's particularly encouraging if the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama is indeed the force that helped keep the G-20 from watering down the communique subsidy language. Now it's time for the Obama Administration to lead the world by example by pushing the U.S. Senate to pass the most comprehensive and strongest possible clean energy and climate legislation in the coming weeks.

The U.S. will never have a better moment to do what is right for both the U.S. and the world's economies, security and environment.

The November meeting of the G-20 is in South Korea, a country that has been making progressive efforts to curb climate change. This gives hope that climate and fossil fuel subsidies will play a more pivotal role in those talks, especially if the U.S. Senate has passed an energy and climate bill by then.

Disappointed by Toronto, the world will next look to Seoul to learn whether the G-20 will deliver on moving the world away from fossil fuels. There is no better solution for any nation's economic woes than creating low-carbon economies that will create new jobs and enhance national security for each country.

Jennifer Haverkamp is managing director of the Environmental Defense Fund's international climate program and blogs for EDF Talks Global Climate.

Reuters AlertNet is not responsible for the content of external websites.