The Maiming of Copenhagen

I attended a talk by a diplomat, James L. Hunt, last night.  The title of his speech was Copenhagen, a Post Mortem.  He was involved in the negotiations leading up to Copenhagen as a representative of the EU and of the Czech Republic.  He discussed both acute and chronic conditions that led to the maiming of the Copenhagen Accord.  He pointed to the global economic crisis as an example of an acute condition that crippled Copenhagen: leaders and negotiators were so preoccupied with the economic meltdown that their concerns about climate change were sidelined.

He also pointed out that elected governments with a short term focus (short term as compared to reversing climate change) and  sharp national focus are singularly ill equipped to deal with any problem with a long term focus and a global reach.  Dealing with  climate change is viewed by the public as a burden and is certainly not a vote winner for any political party espousing it.  The Liberal Party of Canada is well aware of Mr. Hunt's last point.......

He also discussed the fact that economists such as Lord Stern have judged that the costs of inaction far outweigh  the costs of delaing with climate change now - and that win -win situations exist.  (I have previousl mentioned that reducing greenhouse gas emissions can save corporations, cities, and indiviuals  money .)

So - what to do?

Create  political will:  make it imperative for political parties to deal with climate change.  Generate conditions that make it impossible for poiticians to ignore the consequences of climate change. Keep sending your elected representatives letters demanding a legally binding, science based international agreement on cliamte change.  Alter your own behaviour: buy energy efficent vehicles (or take public transit) and appliances.  Talk to your friends and encourage them to do the same. 

And spend some time thinking about Mr Hunt's point that national governments are badly equipped to deal with long term problems with a global focus.  Who might  cope with these problems effectively? He also asked "Is the model of national eonomic competition the right model?" What is the answer to that?

Culture and Climate Change

http://www.goethe.de/ges/umw/prj/kuk/ein/en4589306.htm

What will the climate be like in future? How will our society change? How will people around the world react, and how will they cope with all this?   Equally wide-ranging are the artistic statements and messages that the artists seek to communicate: they include documentation, even meditation, as well as quiet criticism and vociferous activism. Besides the fine arts, it is above all films and performances that explore questions of climate change. Architecture and urban planning produce results that have a concrete impact on our everyday lives; they react to change processes and to calls for sustainable concepts, and attempt to use innovative solutions to achieve a new “greener” way to build.

Apparently, I'm not the only person wondering what the future will look like.... What will our society look like if we begin to deal seriously with the issue of climate change?  What would a velvet climate revolution look like?

Let's assume that the heads of government in Copenhagen should resolve incisive measures to minimize greenhouse gas emissions. Then, we would not only need to drastically lower consumption of energy from fossil fuels, but we would also need to tremendously change our daily habits. I call this our daily Copenhagen: a culture of wasting resources is coming to an end. To respond to climate change, we need to develop a culture of participation in our societies as well as completely new global alliances. In the southern hemisphere, local knowledge is very important. This can teach us how to deal consciously with scarce resources.

Good, Liberal, Compassionate People

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/21/copenhagen-failure-us-senate-vested-interests

So what happens now? That depends on the other non-player at Copenhagen: you. For the past few years good, liberal, compassionate people – the kind who read the Guardian – have shaken their heads and tutted and wondered why someone doesn't do something. Yet the number taking action has been pathetic. Demonstrations which should have brought millions on to the streets have struggled to mobilise a few thousand. As a result the political cost of the failure at Copenhagen is zero. Where are you?

Is this music not to your taste, sir, or madam? Perhaps you would like our little orchestra to play something louder, to drown out that horrible grinding noise.

I'm not going to sit on the Titanic waiting for someone else to do something.  I will continue to write the PM (I must  be his favourite correspondent by now,)  I will lobby our municipal government to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and I will persuade, cajole, and motivate every perosn I meet.  What about you?

Business As Usual

The planet's future does not concern us.  Starvation in Africa does not concern us.  Beetle kill in the Interior of BC does not raise a flicker of distress in anyone but unemployed forestry workers. Future potential drought and consequent hunger in Asia does not worry us - even if those Asians without water have nuclear weapons. The disappearance of small Pacific Islands like the Maldives under the waves is not a bother to us. An ice free Arctic will not be a problem to anyone except those pesky polar bears. We will carry on - down the road to disaster - no matter how Lumumba Di - Aping, the negotiator for the G 77 group of countries,  and the  President of the Maldives natter on.  We will not listen - their words do not concern us.

That is implicit  in the Copenhagen Accord : it is a nonbinding  agreement with no targets.  Any mention of containing temperature rises to 1.5 C has been struck from the agreement.  Even more astonishingly, so has any effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 80 % by 2050.

To hell with the politicians!  We will have to find a way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions without them: we must create a velvet climate revolution.   Tonight, I cannot imagine how  - but we will find a way.  We must  - we cannot accept institutionalized intergenerational and social injustice.

“We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.”  Martin Luther King, Jr.

"HOPE is the thing with feathers,That perches in the soul, And sings the tune without the words, And never stops at all" Emily Dickinson

Canadian Values

http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/12/18/climate-canada-award.html

A coalition of environmental groups at the Copenhagen climate change conference gave its "Fossil of the Year" award to Canada on Friday.
The citation called Canada "the absolute worst country at the talks."

We're number one ! Splendid!  
And:
http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/12/18/troops-afghan-investigation018.html

Canada's military police have been quietly investigating allegations for more than a year that the country's troops abused Afghan detainees.

Canadian soldiers captured the detainees sometime in 2008 and the investigation into their conduct has been ongoing for at least a year....MacKay apparently never told the House there were allegations against Canadian troops, at least one of which is still being investigated.
That is in addition to the ongoing court martial of a Canadian captain charged earlier this year with murdering a wounded Afghan fighter in his custody.

New Canadian values defined:  torture, a blatant disregard for environmental justice, and a disregard for the truth.   Makes one proud to be Canadian, doesn't it?

What He Said On the UN Climate Conference at Copenhagen

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/18/copenhagen-negotiators-bicker-filibuster-biosphere

At no point has the injustice at the heart of multilateralism been addressed or even acknowledged: the interests of states and the interests of the world's people are not the same. Often they are diametrically opposed. In this case, most rich and rapidly developing states have sought through these talks to seize as great a chunk of the atmosphere for themselves as they can – to grab bigger rights to pollute than their competitors. The process couldn't have been better designed to produce the wrong results.

Even before this new farce began it was beginning to look as if it might be too late to prevent two or more degrees of global warming. The nation states, pursuing their own interests, have each been passing the parcel of responsibility since they decided to take action in 1992. We have now lost 17 precious years, possibly the only years in which climate breakdown could have been prevented. This has not happened by accident: it is the result of a systematic campaign of sabotage by certain states, driven and promoted by the energy industries. This idiocy has been aided and abetted by the nations characterised, until now, as the good guys: those that have made firm commitments, only to invalidate them with loopholes, false accounting and outsourcing. In all cases immediate self-interest has trumped the long-term welfare of humankind. Corporate profits and political expediency have proved more urgent considerations than either the natural world or human civilisation.

It's Sunday

Our church rang its bells 350 times this Sunday .  And Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, preached in Copenhagen.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/13/archbishop-canterbury-copenhagen-service

He said that fear paralysed individuals, corporations and governments from making the choices needed to affect real and lasting change.  "We are afraid because we don't know how we can survive without the comforts of our existing lifestyle. We are afraid that new policies will be unpopular with a national electorate. We are afraid that younger and more vigorous economies will take advantage of us – or we are afraid that older, historically dominant economies will use the excuse of ecological responsibility to deny us our proper and just development."  But humans were not "doomed to carry on in a downward spiral of the greedy, addictive, loveless behaviour" that had brought mankind to this crisis and he urged people to scrutinise their lifestyles and policies and how these demonstrated care for creation. He called on people to consider what a sustainable and healthy relationship with the world would look like.

Amen.

From Elizabeth May's Blog on Copenhagen

http://greenparty.ca/blogs/7/2009-12-13/sunday-update

.... Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, head of the IPCC. Dr. Pachauri confirmed what I have seen as best science: that we need to ensure GHGs stop rising and start falling by 2015, or it will be too late. He called for large scale grassroots mobilization and citizen movements to push governments.


Greenpeace's huge message: "Politicians talk. Leaders Act."

Candle Light Vigil In Kamloops December 11, 2009 (check for new posts below this one)

Kamloops citizens concerned about rich countries' lack of action on climate change will have another chance to send a message to politicians  at the UN Copenhagen climate talks. 

 People are invited to gather at Pioneer Park on the banks of the South Thompson River at 6:30 pm on December 11th for a candlelight “Vigil for Survival”.

Please dress warmly and bring a windproof light source.

Which is the Warmest Decade on Record?

I'll give you a hint - you are living through it. 
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/08/met-office-warmest-decade

The past 10 years have been the warmest in recorded history, according to the UK Met Office.  The Met Office also released the raw data from around 1,500 global monitoring stations in an effort to satisfy critics who have demanded that researchers be more transparent with their data in the wake of the email hacking row at the University of East Anglia. In a separate announcement, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) in Geneva said today that 2009 will be one of the 10 warmest individual years recorded.

Please read the entire article: it makes clear that, unless you are a diehard conspiracy theorist intent on grimly ignoring reality, global warming is happening right now ...and punishing the poorest nations most.  Reducing our greenhouse gas emissions is a matter of social and environmental justice.

As always, please let the Prime Minister of Canada know that you want him to commit to a binding, science based, and just deal at Copenhagen.

And You Thought Only Climate Change Deniers Wanted Copenhagen to Fail

No one has called James Hansen a climate change denier - or, if they have, they haven't paid any attention to the news since -  oh  - 1987 or so. But the head of the Nasa Goddard Institute for Space Studies thinks it would be better for humanity if the Copenhagen talks collapsed.  Don't believe me?  Check
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/02/copenhagen-climate-change-james-hansen

In Hansen's view, dealing with climate change allows no room for the compromises that rule the world of elected politics. "This is analagous to the issue of slavery faced by Abraham Lincoln or the issue of Nazism faced by Winston Churchill," he said. "On those kind of issues you cannot compromise. You can't say let's reduce slavery, let's find a compromise and reduce it 50% or reduce it 40%." He added: "We don't have a leader who is able to grasp it and say what is really needed. Instead we are trying to continue business as usual."

It is a very interesting article........and thought provoking.  Should we be as uncompromising as James Hansen?

Apparently Peer Pressure Is Effective

http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/11/27/commonwealth-meeting.html

The United Nations secretary general added his voice Friday to the chorus of activists trying to prod Canada into taking greater action on climate change.  Ban Ki-Moon said Canada, as the next country to host the G8 and G20 meetings, must pick up the pace in setting a mid-range goal to curb emissions.  "Many countries, developed and developing countries, have come out with ambitious targets," Ban said.   "And Canada, as one of the leading G8 countries, and G20, Canada is going to soon chair G8. Therefore, it is only natural that Canada should come out with ambitious targets as soon as possible."

http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/11/28/commonwealth-climate.html

Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh hold a meeting at the Commonwealth heads of government summit in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad, on Saturday. (Chris Wattie/Reuters)I look forward to seeing a comprehensive agreement in Copenhagen where we'll actually get on with actually reducing emissions as opposed to setting abstract targets," said Prime Minister Stephen Harper

Well!!!!!  Apparently having scientists call for Canada's expulsion from the Commonwealth,  the UN Secretary General lecture him, and rhe Queen of England and Canada stress the need for action on climate change was all it took to get Prime Minister on board.  Peer pressure works ...now let us add to it by writing the Right Honorable Stepen Harper and telling himm however admirable his words have been, we want to see ACTION.
UPDATE:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/canada-agrees-to-contribute-to-10-billion-climate-change-fund/article1381653/

Canada has agreed to write a cheque for a $10-billion (U.S.) fund that would help poor nations cope with the consequences of climate change but Prime Minister Stephen Harper isn’t budging on calls for his government to offer deeper and faster cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.

If Mr Harper isn't budging on greenhouse gas emissions, just what is the point of helping poorere countries cope with climate change? Or are we only investing in an ark? 

Send him a letter and tell him you want Canada to do better!

"Green Heat on Harper"

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/obamas-commitment-to-copenhagen-puts-green-heat-on-harper/article1377975/

Barack Obama's decision to attend the Copenhagen climate-change conference placed the Harper government on the defensive at a time of rising federal-provincial tensions over environment policy and an internal report that faults federal efforts.

A recent Treasury Board report on the performance of all federal departments has harsh words for Ottawa's efforts. The report found a "declining performance" in air quality, biodiversity, and greenhouse gas emissions.

In previous dire times, Canada responded to a crisis without checking to see what the Americans were going to do. Canada went to war a week after Britain declared war in 1939: America waited to fight the Nazis until Hitler lost his mind and delcared war on them after Pearl Harbour.  Climate change is THE biggest crisis  humanity faces. Why are we waiting to follow America instead of demonstrating leadership?