Placards for the taking at Global Day of Action Climate Demonstrations, Copenhagen

I wrote this post yesterday, but am only now getting to blog it. Apologies readers….

Monday, 14 December 2009: Today I’ve been unable to get into the negotiations. An hour and a half before the official plenary begins at 10.00am there was a chaotic mass of close to one thousand people trying to get into the Bella Centre, where the talks are being held. The line wasn’t moving and we heard that they might be ‘rationing’ the NGO observers one day early.

Tomorrow was when thia ‘rationing’ was scheduled to begin – a system whereby each registered non-government organisation (NGO) would be given one pass per three participants and would need to share this pass between them. It seems this process has been introduced one day early in an attempt to limit the numbers of people in the Bella Centre to something manageable. One tweet I read this morning said there were 35,000 people wanting entry to the Bella Centre, which had a capacity of 15,000 people. Continue Reading

Yet another action inside the Copenhagen talks Day 5

The vast space that is the Bella Centre in Copenhagen is packed to the rafters with UN staff, parties, NGOs, activists, industry lobbyists and opportunistic green entrepreneurs all attempting to exert influence over the United Nations climate negotiations in some form.

Five days into the talks the task of getting all nations to agree on a fair, ambitious and legally binding treaty by the end of next week is starting to look very daunting indeed.

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Inside the main plenary hall, Copenhagen climate talks

This morning in the main plenary session of the Conference of the Parties there were rousing speeches by members of the Alliance of Smaller Island States in response to Tuvalu’s proposal under Article 17 of the Convention for a new Protocol, which Tuvalu suggested calling the Copenhagen Protocol.

Tuvalu spoke eloquently for a new legally binding Protocol that limits warming to 1.5 degrees celsius and stabilises the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere to 350ppm. They said “Our survival is contingent on this proposal. It’s a matter of survival.”

Here’s what some other countries, particularly vulnerable to climate change, had to say in response to Tuvalu’s proposal:

Cape Verde: “What you’ve just heard are calls for help. They are demanding to survive. They are trying to express the despair of their populations. When they labour the point that they are trying to leave Copenhagen with a legally binding treaty, they are saying that the nature of the planet is critical to their survival…. We will be the first to disappear. We will be the ones to precede you in this climate crisis. Tuvalu represents those who are going to die, who are going to disappear. These are whole countries, whole cultures, whole states who are going to disappear.”

Comoros:“a legally binding agreement is nothing else but giving the rights to small nations to exist.”

Barbados: “the scale of the climate change threat requires an ambitious response.”

Cook Islands: “Crucial to our survival that Copenhagen delivers a robust agreement.”

It will be a very interesting next two days.

Look who I ran into outside the Copenhagen climate talks on the second day of the conference.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q07-AUhU5c8]

I’ve joined the thousands of other climate activists at the UN climate talks in Copenhagen hoping to be able to work alongside them to pressure world leaders to be seal a strong deal over the next two weeks. As a representative on The Wilderness Society’s delegation I’ll be particularly immersed in the negotiations around protecting the world’s forests as part of the final treaty. Approximately 20% of global greenhouse gas emissions are caused by degrading forests and bushland – an enormous contribution to climate change that must be part of any final deal.

Recent media reports have indicated that the leaders may not be able to negotiate a legally binding treaty. Considering world leaders have had two decades to get this right, this is inexcusable. They must act with courage and leadership in the next two weeks. However, what we don’t want is a treaty that won’t do the job. The focus by the Australian and other Governments on limiting the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to 450ppm is out of sync with the latest science that indicates 300-350 ppm is the limit – and we’ve already passed that point! The 450 target, which the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Climate Change Minister Penny Wong like to talk about, has only ever given us a chance of not reaching dangerous tipping points, not a certainty. Given we’re talking about the future of the planet and millions of people who rely on it, it’s about time targets were adopted that provided certainty to future generations.

So stay tuned for further updates. I went to register yesterday, but there was an enormous lineup outside the conference that seemed to stretch forever and not be moving. Given how foggy and freezing it was, I thought I’d try my luck first thing this morning. Penny Wong is arriving at the conference this morning also and I’ve heard there will be some protesters to greet her. I’ll post pics.