PARIS, France (AFP) – UN chiefs and campaigners welcomed the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize yesterday for enshrining climate change as the inescapable issue of our time, but the White House said it would not affect US policies.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called the Nobel a reward for former US vice president Al Gore’s “exceptional commitment and conviction” and for the work of the UN Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in having “established beyond doubt that climate change is happening”.

“As a result, there is now unprecedented momentum for action on climate change around the world and recognition of the UN as the forum for reaching agreement on it,” he said.

But the White House made clear it would not provoke a change of heart in George W Bush’s administration, which has refused to impose mandatory caps on greenhouse gas emissions and rejected the Kyoto Protocol for doing so.

“Obviously it’s an important recognition and we’re sure the vice president is thrilled,” spokesman Tony Fratto said, referring to Gore, adding that Bush was “happy for the vice president”.

But when asked if the Nobel would put pressure on the Bush administration to adopt a “Gore-style” approach, Fratto replied: “No”.

The award was announced less than three weeks after Ban hosted a special summit in New York to break the political deadlock on tackling climate change.

Parties to the UN’s Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) gather in Bali, Indonesia, in December in a bid to define negotiations on faster, deeper cuts in emissions of greenhouse gases from the end of 2012, when Kyoto’s pledges run out.

Gore and IPCC chairman Rajendra Pachauri pleaded for urgency.

“We face a true planetary emergency. The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity. It is also our greatest opportunity to lift global consciousness to a higher level,” said Gore.

“I will be doing everything I can to try to understand how to best use the honour and recognition of this award as a way of speeding up the change in awareness, and the change in urgency,” he added.

“The message should go out to everyone – developed and developing countries – we are all in this together. We have to make sure that climate change does not afflict the inhabitants of this planet,” Pachauri said.

Gore pointedly did not take questions from reporters, ignoring shouted questions about whether he may yet enter the 2008 US presidential race in light of the award.

Analysts said that even if Gore spurns fresh calls for a 2008 White House run, his Nobel prize-winning environmental crusade has thrust global warming into the 2008 US presidential election campaign like never before.

The European Union, which is leading the charge for the Bali talks, said the laureate’s work had “raised awareness all over the world”.