During these two press conferences I found a few interesting contradictions and points worth to notice. The first interesting statement is made by Joe Lionel where he concludes the following:

“The Scientific community is asking for the upper level of 25-40 % for industrialized world. Let’s say that 20 % is definitely not enough, that’s the conclusion what the scientific panel has found. therefore 30 % would even not be enough, that would match half-way what we could then do. It is not a scientific definition but a political assesment.”

Here he completely agrees that neither 20 % of the European target nor their 30 % target is enough. We have to do more to come up to a scientific standard. So the question I ask here is why is a political agenda the driving force if the science is clear? If we are to keep below a 2 degree target we also need progressive action inline with science, not inline with the political assesment made.

The next interesting statement is made by Stavros Dimas where he is commenting the ‘great deed’ of financing CDM.

“We have also invested in CDMs, many people does perhaps not know, that there are right now 3 billion euros worth of projects in CDMs, from this 80 % is from European Union and already 4 billion has already been dispersed. This is money coming from the European Union.”

When you hear this for the first time, you think: “Great, EU is contributing to the welfare of other countries and help them mitigate their emissions.” On a closer note what Stavros Dimas seems to propose here is that you should count the money given in CDM projects as climate finance. He specfically mentions that: “This is money coming from the European Union”. In this context money should NOT be mentioned AT ALL if they want to count the emission reductions that are made through these very CDM projects. However if they rather want to feel good about all the money being spent in CDM one should not count the emission reductions done. Put it simply, one can never eat the cake and keep it at the same time.

The next statement is from Andreas Carlgren where he explains the strategy of the European Union and how their strategy with a conditionalized target is going to put pressure on other countries.

“It is conditionalized because otherwise we would give up and sell out our target to cheap without making sure that united states and china would also deliver sufficiently we cover a bit more than a tenth of the emissions of the world. If the two countries covering half of the emissions of the world wouldn’t deliver sufficiently. [ ... ]. It would be just in vain and not for the good of the planet if we would sell out this target [30 %] too cheap. That’s why we use it as a lever. That’s why we put pressure on the others”

If we compare what Carlgren is saying to what Joe Linen is telling I’m wondering where the leverage point is? Joe tells us that 20 % is scientifically illiterate, at the same time Andreas tells us that this waiting game will be used to get others to raise their goals. The problems is that currently all the developed countries have scientifically illiterate targets. Would not a better strategy be to line up with the NGO, be the examplerary rolemodel, then all focus would be on the countries that do less. There would be massive media attention, generated from both NGOs and press and a lot more pressure would come from this than the meekly political pressure that we are seeing right now. That would be an absolute brilliant move. Because I do believe that EU:s core intention is for Fair Ambitious and Binding deal.

The countries have to start understand that we live in a different world than we did 30 years ago. Civil society has a lot more power with the internet technology, this could be utilized for good if the parties of the negotiations only understood how to do so.

Jonathan Sundqvist is following the COP15 negotiations in Copenhagen from a Swedish/European perspective and is writing about it on Adopt a Negotiator as well as here on Green Blog.

Today I walked around and asked a number of young people what they expect of Copenhagen and the climate conference. What strikes me is how important young people are. It is we who will take over the world afterwards.

Those who I talk with here in Copenhagen really cares about what happens here on our planet. And they all agree that something must be done about the climate and environmental crisis we are facing as soon as possible. When the world has its eyes focused on the Copenhagen climate conference, it is far too good an opportunity to let it slip out of one’’s hands. It is now we must act for ourselves when we grow older, for our children and our grandchildren. For all farmers, all women, for everyone who are already facing water shortages, for all who live below sea level.

We must not only act, we can act, and if we’ll act we will make a big success!

It’s here! The 15th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP15) and the last chance we have to take action against “the greatest threat the world has ever faced”. The climate conference is taking place at Bella Center in Copenhagen from the 7th to the 18th of December. Around 15000 participants from 192 countries representing governments, the business community, and civil society is expected to attend. About 110 world leaders will come to Copenhagen, and last week Barack Obama promised to come to the last days of the climate conference.

COP 15 President Connie Hedegaard and UNFCCC Executive Secretary Yvo de Boer have, after the first day of the conference, said that there is “an unprecedented political will to reach an agreement”. Hedegaard continued by saying that “there is a huge pressure on everyone to deliver not just a deal, but an ambitious deal in Copenhagen”:

“Don’t believe that anything gets easier if we postpone things now. This is the time. This is now we have the possibility.

We must deliver. Not a deal, but an ambitious deal in Copenhagen. That’s why we are busy, very busy for the next few weeks.”

Yvo de Boer stated that he “believe the conference will write history, but we must make sure it writes the right history”.

“Time is up. People are speaking out. We’ve spent two years negotiating and now this process must deliver, he said.”

Also watch the four-minute long COP15 opening film which was shown to thousands of delegates in Copenhagen today. “We have made a film which speaks to the heart rather than to the brain,” said the Danish director of the film Mikkel Blaabjerg Poulsen.

Photo credit: JC i Núria

Much sheer speculation has been written about the upcoming Copenhagen climate negotiations, and we will see much more over the next few weeks. What is this conference about, and what are the real issues at stake for the future of the world?

The conference in Copenhagen was set to negotiate a follow-up treaty to the Kyoto Accords, set to expire in 2012, a treaty that the Senate and the Bush administration refused to ratify or cooperate with. While China has recently passed the US as the largest emitter of global warming gases, the US is still far, far ahead of all other countries in per capita emissions, making US efforts a crucial aspect of whatever efforts the world makes.

The Kyoto Accords set aspirational guidelines for countries to shoot for as they worked to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. A large majority of the world’s countries ratified the Accords, and some made serious efforts to meet them, but few countries managed to do so. The European Union set up a carbon trading scheme, and several European countries have made large-scale investments in alternative renewable energy. Other countries only approached their targets due to decreased economic activity, primarily Russia.

An international treaty with mandatory limits on carbon emissions has become more urgent. The climate is heating more rapidly than earlier predictions, and the current consequences of worldwide climate change are accumulating and intensifying. As well, shifting to a new energy economy is a massive undertaking, and current plans require an immediate boost if the world is to keep emissions to a manageable level, since this effort will take many decades. In the meantime, carbon dioxide emissions are still increasing.

Major contributors to carbon emissions include transportation using fossil fuels, coal-burning electric plants, deforestation including the burning of forests, unnecessary heat loss from both residential and office buildings, industrial agricultural processes, and increased emissions from the cattle industry which has been growing rapidly. Controlling emissions will mean efforts in all these areasnThe main issues leading up to Copenhagen are:

• Mandatory emission limits for developed countries;
• Emission goals for developing countries;
• A fund from the developed countries to compensate developing countries for technological development, for efforts to mitigate the effects of global warming, and for stopping or slowing deforestation (The UN environmental program proposes a minimum of $10 billion);
• Whether or not the US will actively participate, since cap-and-trade legislation will not be passed by the Senate before the Copenhagen Conference, and the Senate refused to ratify the Kyoto Accords;
• Whether the conference will result in a treaty, as originally projected, or will only agree to a “politically binding” agreement to negotiate a treaty in the next two years.

There is increasing pressure for President Obama to attend the Copenhagen Conference, especially since he will be nearby in Norway to accept the Nobel Peace Prize. Other world leaders are attending, including Sarkozy of France, Lula of Brasil, and possibly Brown of England. However, there is some reluctance on the part of the administration, since the conference is not likely to result in a completely successful treaty.

On his recent trip to Asia, Obama signed important agreements with China on carbon research and technology development. China, which has until now been almost as much of an obstacle to an international treaty as the US, is now in the forefront of investment in sustainable energy, in production of solar panels, in conservation efforts. The Chinese stimulus was almost 40% devoted to emissions control, conservation, smart electric grid development, and alternative energy investment, compared to about 12% of the US stimulus.

One argument used in recent years by conservative opponents of any climate change efforts has been that the US shouldn’t agree to any limits until and unless China and India agreed to mandatory emissions limits first. Now that China is outpacing the US in many ways, this is a harder argument to make, even though China still opposes mandatory limits on developing countries, which have a much lower per capita emission rate, which are more in need of economic development, and which have contributed much less to the emissions which have already accumulated in the atmosphere.

Other countries are also in advance of the US in particular fields. Germany leads the world in electricity from wind power. Brazil leads in the production of alternative biofuels (from sugar cane and sugar cane scrap instead of from corn). The Netherlands, the most threatened developed country due to it exposure to rising sea levels, leads in adaptation efforts, abandoning unsustainable reclaimed land, improving dikes and water control.

Opponents of US climate change action are primarily, though not only, conservative Republicans. They use every argument to prevent or delay any US action, even the inadequate steps proposed in the two major bills before Congress. The Waxman-Markey Bill passed the House months ago. A similar bill in the Senate, whose prime sponsors are Barbra Boxer and John Kerry, will be debated more seriously starting next year, after the battle over health care reform is completed. The conservatives deny climate change is real, they deny that it is cause by human activity, they claim it will be too expensive, that it will hurt the U.S. economy too much, that various industries should get a pass from any mandatory limits, and so on. James Inhofe, Republican senator from Oklahoma, intends to set up a sideshow in Copenhagen for climate change deniers.

The exact details of whatever the conference comes up with are less important than that the world is seen to be taking real steps, placing more pressure on the US to act. The longer the US waits to start seriously tackling climate change and carbon emissions, the more difficult and expensive the transition will be, and the more harmful will be the results of the current impacts of climate change.

On December 11th and 12th, the climate change campaign 350.org is planning candlelight vigils around the country, at the offices of Congress people and at other symbolic sites. The same groups sponsored the over 5,000 October actions around the world to demand that the world work to reduce the amount of carbon in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million from the current 380 (the pre-industrial level was about 270 ppm). Go to their website to join an action or to initiate one.

Author: Marc Brodine, People’s World

Mohamed Nasheed, President of the Maldives, gives this inspiring speech in light of the upcoming UN Climate Change Conference this December – the last chance we have to take action against “the greatest threat the world has ever faced”.

In the video (above) Nasheed announces that his country, which is under severe threat from climate change, will go completely carbon neutral in a decade. He also asks the world to unite against carbon pollution and decarbonize the entire world economy.

The Maldives approached Chris Goodall and Mark Lynas, two British climate change experts, to develop a carbon-neutral plan for its country. The two came up with a “radical” carbon-neutrality plan that includes 155 wind turbines, rooftop solar panels and a biomass plant that will burn coconut husks. According to Goodall and Lynas the Maldives will become completely carbon neutral by 2020. The plan is expected to cost $110 million a year for a 10 year period.

You can read more about the Maldives carbon neutral plans over at the Guardian.