The refusal of the US to ratify the Kyoto protocol on climate change is damaging its environmental industries.

Renewable energy companies in the US, which rejected the protocol early in the first term of President George W. Bush, suffered a share price fall of 13.8 per cent on average since the beginning of the year, a study from New Energy Finance, an energy consultancy, has found. Renewable energy companies in the countries participating in the agreement, including European Union member states, Canada and Japan, saw their share prices rise by an average of 21.9 per cent, by contrast.