Tomorrow morning another large and important demonstration will be held in Copenhagen. This time the Climate Justice Action network is organizing a huge non-violent demonstration where the demonstrators are planning to march into the Bella Center, where the climate talks are being held. At the same time concerned NGO representatives and delegates are going to walk out and successfully shut down the talks and establish a people’s assembly. Why? Because the deal we really need is not on the table.

“On the 16th of December, at the start of the high-level “ministerial” phase of the two-week summit, we, the movements for global justice, will take over the conference for one day and transform it into a Peoples Assembly.

Our goal is to disrupt the sessions and open a space inside the UN area to hold the Assembly. The assembly will give a voice to those who are not being heard, it will be an opportunity to change the agenda, to discuss the real solutions, to send a clear message to the world calling for climate justice.”

During her days in Copenhagen Naomi Klein has encouraged people to take part in this demonstration. Yesterday she spoke about tomorrow’s action at an event in Christiania: see video one and video two. In an interview with Katherine Goldstein, from the Huffington Post, Klein said that “its a possibility that there will be mass arrests” during the protest:

“I’m not concerned about people’s safety, but I do think its a possibility that there will be mass arrests. I think its a powerful message that people care enough to get arrested.”

And the organizers of the protest are expecting confrontation with the Danish police. In an interview with the Guardian Kevin Smith, an organiser for activist group Climate Camp, said:

“The Danish government knows just how embarrassing it will be when hundreds of delegates walk out tomorrow to join us in the protest tomorrow against the climate talks, and it is trampling over all manner of civil liberties to try and prevent that from happening.”

Earlier today Tadzio Mueller, a spokesman for Climate Justice Action, was arrested by plainclothes police as he left the Bella centre.

“It’s unbelievable that in a supposed democracy, undercover police are silencing spokespeople that are criticising the climate talks”, Smith said. “How far are the Danish authorities prepared to go to stop tomorrow’s protest from going ahead?”

Watch Naomi Klein talk about the Reclaim Power! demonstration tomorrow in this video from Grist:

Photo credit: adopt a negotiator

Here are some of the biggest and most interesting news today related to the ongoing COP15 climate conference in Copenhagen:

A draft text for a potential final agreement in Copenhagen was leaked today to the Guardian. The “Danish text” has made the developing countries “furious” as the draft agreement would give even more powers to the rich nations, weakening UN’s future role as well as abandon the Kyoto protocol. Some say this shows the true agenda in Copenhagen, others believe the draft is unofficial and may have changed a lot since its first creation.

The Environmental Protection Agency in the USA has declared that carbon dioxide is a public danger. This would make it possible for Barack Obama to impose his proposed emissions cuts without an agreement in the sceptic U.S. Senate. A report released today by the Center for Biological Diversity claims that Obama now has the clear legal authority to make a binding commitment for greenhouse gas reductions in Copenhagen without waiting for Congress.

The UK Met Office and World Meteorological Organization have announced, in yet another report, that the first decade of this century is “by far” the warmest on record: “The decade of the 2000s (2000–2009) was warmer than the decade spanning the 1990s (1990–1999), which in turn was warmer than the 1980s (1980–1989).” The National Climatic Data Center (NOAA) in USA also released a similar report today: “The 2000 – 2009 decade will be the warmest on record, with its average global surface temperature about 0.96 degree F above the 20th century average. This will easily surpass the 1990s value of 0.65 degree F.”

Gordon Brown says the EU must cut its emissions with 30% by 2020 – but only if an ambitious global deal is reached in Copenhagen: “We’ve got to make countries recognise that they have to be as ambitious as they say they want to be. It’s not enough to say ‘I may do this, I might do this, possibly I’ll do this’. I want to create a situation in which the European Union is persuaded to go to 30%.”

Speaking at Klimaforum09 (Climate Forum 09), the alternative climate conference, in Copenhagen Naomi Klein said this is the last chance we have to save the world, but at the same time she expressed her doubt whether an ambitious deal would be made at the Bella Centre: “The Bella Center is the biggest case of disaster capitalism. The deal we really need is not even on the table.” Klein also criticized the Hopenhagen climate campaign: “The globe has Siemens logo on the bottom and the whole event is sponsored by Coke. That is a capitalization of hope but Klimaforum09 is where the real hope lies,” she said. “Klimaforum is not about giving charity to the developing world its about taking responsibility and the industrialized countries cleaning up our own mess,” she concluded.

The White House says the leaked “climategate” email story is “silly” and that the science is clear: “I think scientists are clear on the science. I think many on Capitol Hill are clear on the science. I think that this notion that there is some debate … on the science is kind of silly.” But just look at these scandalous emails!

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.

The EU didn’t have a commissioner of the climate before. According to Barroso her job will be to retain the leadership role of Europe in global efforts to reign in greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming. It will include the tasks and responsibilities of the former Commissioner for the Environment.

Her Google quote of the day is noteworthy too:

“Governments from all over the world are delivering before the climate conference. US and China have come forward. All across the globe, things are moving. This is good news”

Good luck, Connie.

• AP / Barroso unveils lineup of new European Commission
• EU commission unveils new faces, new portfolios
• Photogallery of new commissioners at Wall Street Journal
• Connie Hedegaard entry at Wikipedia

Maybe he liked the city? Either way, President Barack Obama announced today that he will attend the climate negotiations in Copenhagen this December. The climate summit is held between 7-18 December and is the last chance we have to take action against “the greatest threat the world has ever faced”.

“U.S. President Barack Obama will go to Copenhagen for a U.N. climate change meeting on December 9, hoping to add momentum to an international process despite slow progress on a domestic bill to cut carbon emissions”, Reuters reports.

“Obama planned to make a visit at the beginning of the climate negotiations in Denmark, an administration official told Reuters on Wednesday, before picking up the Nobel Peace Prize at a ceremony in neighboring Oslo.”

With him to the climate summit Obama has a pledge to cut emissions in the USA with 17% from 2005 levels by 2020, 30% by 2025, 42% by 2030 and 83% by 2050. But these numbers are much lower than those proposed by the EU and other industrialised countries such as Norway.

The numbers are also much lower than what the science says is needed to avert catastrophic man-made climate change. According to the IPCC report in 2007 industrialised countries such as the USA needs to cut their emissions by 25-40% by 2020. The global environmental alliance TckTckTck calls for developed countries to cut emissions with 40% by 2020. And according to paleoclimate scientist Dr Andrew Glikson we need to cut carbon emissions with up to 80% by 2020 to avoid catastrophe.

In response to Obama’s announcement the UN climate chief, Yvo de Boer, said that “the world is very much looking to the United States to come forward with an emission reduction target and contribute to financial support to help developing countries.”

But Obama does not plan to join around 65 other world leaders during the final days of the UN climate meeting. Despite this the Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen praised Obama’s decision and said that “the visit underlines the president’s desire to contribute to an ambitious, global agreement in Copenhagen”.

World Wildlife Fund’s Climate Program Director, Keya Chatterjee, said that the environmental organization is “pleased” that President Obama will attend the climate summit. But also noted that:

“If his presence during the latter days of the COP becomes necessary to secure the right commitments, we hope the President will be willing to return to Copenhagen with the rest of the world’s leaders during the final stages of the negotiations.”

Greenpeace USA Global Warming Campaign Director, Damon Moglen, response was a bit harsher. In a statement Moglen said Obama’s short visit “amounts to nothing more than President Obama taking a photo opportunity on his way to pick up the Nobel Peace Prize.” Moglen also said that the international community cannot take Obama’s emission pledge seriously:

“The proposed emissions reductions target – 17% below 2005 levels by 2020 – is less than one seventh of what the European Union leaders have said they are prepared to commit. The proposed reduction refers to 2005 emissions and not the standard 1990 baseline used by scientists and policymakers around the world. Arranging the numbers this way may be more politically palatable, but it misleads the public on information key to its welfare.

Science calls for the United States and the developed world to cut pollution by at least 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 80 to 95 percent by 2050. Using this accepted standard, the announced target that the U.S. plans to bring to the table shoots for only a 4 percent cut in pollution.”

You can learn more about the Copenhagen meeting here.

When it comes to climate change, journalists are notorious for getting even the simplest of facts wrong. Take, for example, an article from March 2007, by Julie Wheldon, which proclaims “Greenhouse Effect is a Myth, Say Scientists” in the headline. Yet, the body of the article does not argue that there is no greenhouse effect. In fact, no scientist would argue that the greenhouse effect doesn’t exist. Without it, life as we know it would not exist.

So why does the media get it wrong? Well, there are a few reasons, put forth by different researchers. Here, I summarize the four main concepts from three articles: Wilson, “Communicating Climate Change Through the Media”; Boykoff & Boykoff, “Balance as Bias: Global Warming and the US Prestige Press”; and Antilla, “Climate of Scepticism: US Newspaper Coverage of the Science of Climate Change” to explain what goes on behind the headlines.

1. Misinterpreting Studies

Journalists, generally, do not have science degrees. However, when it’s a journalist’s job to translate findings from scientific articles into reasonably understandable and easy-to-read newspaper articles or TV news stories, this becomes quite the challenge.

The first problem is that the journalists themselves might not understand the complex concepts. The second problem is that they might try to simplify the concepts for others. When both problems occur, a factually incorrect story results, like Julie Wheldon’s.

2. Creating a Story

Journalists require news stories that fit the time (TV, radio), space (newspapers, magazines, blogs) and budget constraints. In TV, visuals are also crucial. However, scientific studies and theories are often too time-consuming, expensive, or risk seeming dull on TV without visuals. Thus, climate change coverage often falls by the wayside.

Reporters often try to make climate change relevant by relating it to local weather stories. From a journalist’s point of view, this provides a unique, local twist to the ongoing story of climate change. Otherwise, from a newsroom perspective, global warming provides very little potential for an article. Not surprisingly, however, its extremely hard to prove whether one particular storm or flood could be caused by global warming.

3. Drawing an Audience

Whereas scientists’ studies are full of careful phrasing, such as “possibly” and “could”, it is the job of journalists to grab people’s attention through bold headlines, and eye-catching statements. That’s how a scientist’s declaration that “climate change is too complicated to be caused by just one factor, whether CO2 or clouds” (said by Philip Stott and cited by Julie Wheldon’s article) may turn into “Greenhouse Effect is a Myth, Say Scientists” in the headline to catch readers’ attention.

Journalists also have a tendency to create drama by framing climate change in duelling-scientist model. Articles pit scientist against scientist, while ignoring the larger picture and issues.

4. Balance as Bias

No scientists deny that climate change in happening. While this may sound like a bold statement, it’s actually not. The earth’s temperature is rising—no one doubts this. The debate occurs around the details of it, and what the future will be like.

In the field of contemporary journalism, however, objectivity is valued. Thus, reporters will often go out of their way to find an opposing view, to appear balanced. These opposing views are extreme and falsified (like denying the greenhouse effect). The experts cited by journalists often have little relation to the fields of climate science. Paul Reiter, cited by Wheldon, is not a climate science expert, but a malaria researcher. He is quoted as saying “I am not a climatologist, nor an expert on sea level or polar ice. But I do know from talking to many scientists in many disciplines that this consensus is a mirage.” (http://www.eco-imperialism.com/content/article.php3?id=210).    

Highlighting incorrect science just for the sake of having two views can create a bias of its own, when it appears that there is a legitimate debate. This is the phenomenon that the term “balance as bias” describes. 

5. Corporate Ties

Returning to Wheldon’s article, many of  these “experts” she cites are not only unqualified in climatology (like the malaria researcher), but they have ties with the fossil fuel industry and big business.

Ian Clark, for example, is a member of the right wing think-tank organization “The Fraser Institute”. The Fraser institute is infamous for hiring scientists to deny global warming, and is funded by ExxonMobil. Two other organization Clark is involved in (“Competitive Enterprise Institute” and “Heartland Institute”) are also funded by ExxonMobil.

Paul Reiter, again, writes for “Tech Central Station”, a publication that is also funded by ExxonMobil. Two other organizations Reiter is involved with (“Annapolis Center for Science-Based Public Policy” and “International Policy Network”) are —you guessed it—funded by ExxonMobil.

Clearly, these climate change deniers, cited by the media, are swimming in fossil fuel money. It’s easy to find out which denies are connected to the industry. Greenpeace has developed a wonderful tool that traces Exxon Mobil money to publications, politicians, organizations and scientists: http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/campaigns/global-warming-and-energy/exxon-secrets

In theory, the scientists are doing their job, and the journalists are doing theirs. It’s no one’s fault that scientists use careful phrasing, while reports need to create eye-catching headlines. The problem occurs when the two disciplines become tangled together, like they do in the case of climate change.

Wilson’s article documents a study of the public’s climate change knowledge, and the results were disappointing. Many people confused the terms “climate change” and “greenhouse effect” for the same thing. They are not synonymous terms. People also believed that global warming was strongly debated among scientists. Interestingly, the people who scored the lowest are those who reported TV as their main news source.

So, why it matter if the media gets it wrong? Journalism (newspapers, magazines, TV news, etc) is the prime medium through which the public learns about climate change. Unless a person is already somehow educated about the topic, it’s unlikely that they would start reading (or have access to) peer-reviewed scientific journals. Therefore, if the media gets it wrong, chances are, the public will too. And this is a major problem.

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

Photo credit: Julien Harneis

Lord David Puttnam, ambassador for Unicef UK, asks on BBC’s Green Room what kind of price our children and future generations will have to pay for “the three or four carbon-happy generations that have lived before them?”

“Climate change is not just an environmental problem, it is a human rights issue. In fact it’s the biggest child rights problem of our time.

With the potential rise of up to 160,000 child deaths a year in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia directly resulting from climate change, it is children, the most vulnerable children, who will be caught at the centre of the storm.

They will unquestionably carry the greatest burden – both as children and as future adults – and yet they are the least culpable for its damage.”

Puttnam demands that the world “must stop borrowing from the future and act now” on man-made climate change, and that the rights of children should be put as “the core of the climate change policy framework”.

Humble Oil, who is today more known as Exxon, pretty much nailed it back in the 60’s with this advertisement from a 1962 edition of Life Magazine. Oh, the grim irony. It’s also available in full view on Google Books.

A Picture is Worth…
- Car, bus or bicycle?
- Albatross Carcass
- The Global Distribution of Water
- Gasoline Consumption Per Day
- Why Offshore Drilling Won’t Help