Will Ockenden | CreativeCommons

With only 5 negotiating days left before Copenhagen the world faces a monumental challenge at Barcelona. There are a range of potential roadblocks that could scuttle the chances for a strong outcome at Copenhagen, an outcome that the world desperately needs. I believe, however, that the challenges the negotiations face can be overcome with the necessary political will and leadership.

Its Phil here (whom Cara kindly introduced in her last blog), and I will be reporting to you from Barcelona over the week to come.

Barcelona is a fork in the road to Copenhagen. Positive movement in a number of the negotiating streams is absolutely necessary if we are to reach a fair and effective deal at Copenhagen. In one of her previous blogs Cara succinctly outlined the key road blocks that stand in the way of Copenhagen. In summary these are:

• The volume of financing and how it will be raised and spent to assist developing countries mitigate and adapt to climate change
• Mitigation targets for developed countries are far lower than the 25% – 40% below 1990 levels by 2020, required to have a good chance at avoiding dangerous climate change
• Will the Kyoto Protocol continue or will it be replaced by a new treaty?

We all know that Australia can do better and must do better in all these areas. Let me make just a few points to put this debate in focus.

Money matters.

In Australia the debate between the major parties on climate change legislation continues. Unfortunately so much of public airtime is taken up by how much we should subsidise polluting industry. Much to my chagrin the only serious conversation being had is around how much more we can give polluters rather than how much less (apparently several billion dollars is not enough).

Even before any emissions trading legislation gets passed, the Australian government already subsidises the coal, oil and gas industries to the tune of around 8 billion AUD per year. This figure is around double the entire overseas aid program and is in a different order of magnitude to what our government is proposing it will contribute to international climate change mitigation and adaptation financing mechanisms (I will save my rant about our government committing and ADDITIONAL 146 BILLION AUD to our defence force for a different post). Australia can afford to offer much much more at Barcelona.

25%?

I am not sure how many more times I can hear the government state and the media reiterate the figure 25%. I am sure you all know, but just to set things straight the Australian government is unconditionally offering a 4% mitigation target on 1990 levels by 2020 which equates to carbon dioxide equivalent atmospheric concentration of over 550 ppm. This would be a CATASTROPHIC outcome for the whole planet and its inhabitants. The Australian government has offered a very conditional (conditional upon other countries making commitments which they have not indicated they will) 24% reduction on 1990 levels by 2020. The Government and the Garnaut report on climate change suggests, that in a global agreement this would relate roughly to 450ppm. On this figure, our good friend and eminent NASA scientist James Hanson says:

“A CO2 amount of order 450 ppm or larger, if long maintained, would push Earth toward the ice-free state. Although ocean and ice sheet inertia limit the rate of climate change, such a CO2 level likely would cause the passing of climate tipping points and initiate dynamic responses that could be out of humanity’s control.” Target Atmospheric CO2: Where Should Humanity Aim? James Hansen et al.

Australia must at least make its 24% mitigation target UNCONDITIONAL and put on the table more ambitious greenhouse gas reduction targets of at least 40% on 1990 levels by 2020.

Now… all these points have been made before, the same connections have been drawn and the same critiques made (and many better ones!). But something is different. Something has changed.

We are witnesses and participants to the most significant global movement, arguably, of all time! There are hundreds of millions, if not billions of people just like us around the globe desperate to see strong action on climate change. Action that protects the earth’s ecosystems and upholds the rights of the poor. In our ever increasing capacity in Australia we must put MORE pressure on the Australian government to actively and cooperatively pursue a fair and just deal on climate change.

I encourage you to read my blogs from Barcelona, make comments, and encourage your community to get on board and participate in the movement that will save the world as we know it.

Peace,

Phil.

p.s. I will also be blogging on the Australian sister website ‘A Climate For Change‘

No and yes.
The federal government knows, and agrees with, what the science is saying. The sticking point is it is acting in a manner that assumes Canada deserves to pollute more than other rich and industrialized countries.

The government should step up to the plate and commit to doing our part. Canada is now among the top 10 greenhouse gas polluters in the world and is among the top 3 polluters per capita. Yet, every single G8 country is doing more than Canada on global warming. The US, for example, is investing 14x more in renewable energy per capita this year than Canada.

[Read: It's like showing up to a world pot-luck where every one else has cooked a meal and Canada thinks it's appropriate to show up with a bag of potato chips.]

Canada should recognize it is in a very lucky situation in the world to have the ability to invest in, build and develop a clean economy based on leading edge energy efficiency and renewable energy.

[Read: We're the ones that could show up to our place at the table and offer a whole lot more - preferably with ambition, i.e. to the tune of brie, rosemary olive bread, and molten brownies.]

Canada should sign, adopt and implement Bill C-311. It is the government’s responsibility to develop a tough plan that includes Canadian laws to control greenhouse gas pollution to match the recommendations of scientists.

We did it to stop the pollution that caused the hole in the ozone layer – We can do it to fill the hole in our country’s leadership.

How do we plan on doing that?

By ensuring that the Australian delegation know they are being tracked globally throughout the various International meetings as well as at home.

Joining me on the Adopt A Negotiator team as the lead Australian tracker, is the young, inspiring and very talented Phil Ireland from Newcastle, NSW.

Phil will be our on ground tracker for Australia  at both the upcoming Barcelona and Copenhagen UNFCCC meetings, while I will take on a slightly different role organising on ground campaigning here in Australia to put extra pressure on our Government.

While there is a bit of change within the Australian tracker team, one thing remains the same, and that’s YOU.  

We couldn’t do any of this without your support. We are working hard to open up the UN climate talks, so that you can monitor what the Australian delegation are up to, put pressure on them, and hopefully influence our Government’s position. We need you to keep up your fantastic work, leaving comments, sharing your questions, re-posting the blogs, inviting your friends to sign up. Without you, we’re simply two people writing for ourselves!

So, who is Phil?

Not many of you would know, but Phil has been working with me on this project from day dot (as have many AMAZING people) . Phil’s been taking a more behind the scenes role, doing outreach and awareness raising about this project, as well as climate change lobbying more broadly.

Phil and I with Louise Hand (in centre) Ambassador for Climate Change and Australia's lead negotiator.

In the recent months, Phil and I have made a number of trips to Canberra together where I’ve been able to introduce him to key members of the Australian delegation.

Not only is Phil up on who’s who of the delegation, and the Australian government positions, Phil has been actively involved in climate change campaigning for many years now.

His passion for justice for the poor, those who stand to suffer most from climate change, has lead him to do such things as, participate in the non-violent blockades of the world’s largest coal port to meeting with the Prime Minister of Australia to advocate for stronger political action on climate change.

In his spare time, Phil works for the non-government organisation TEAR Australia as the policy and campaigns officer and is also a Ph.D. candidate researching how new frameworks and financing for adaptation to climate change can reduce social and environmental vulnerability for poor communities in South Asia.  Phil has so much to offer to this project and I am really excited see it continue to grow and go from strength to strength!!

Phil and I are going to do everything we possibly can to continue to track the Australian negotiators and hold the Australian Government to account. We have a long way to go, but by all of us working together, in our varying ways and in our different pockets of the world, we can contribute to a movement with ever growing momentum to ensure a safe future climate for all humanity and all life on earth.    

PS. Phil will also be blogging on one of our partner sites, A Climate for Change

From Katmandu to Kenya, from Sydney to Samoa.

People across the globe, from all walks of life are uniting with the one call. We demand to see strong action and bold leadership on the climate crisis. And we demand to see it now.

Today I was lucky enough to be at the Opera House in Sydney, Australia for an inspiring day of community action.

Here are the stories of some of the people I spoke to.

You can read more stories from across our globe here.

I was heading to our nation’s capital with some of my fellow youth climate activists for a day long meeting with the Department of Climate Change, and our Climate Change Minister, Penny Wong about, you guessed it, all things climate.

The meeting was for a broad group of Australian youth who are tracking and engaging with the UN climate negotiations to hear, from the government’s perspective, how things are tracking as we tick down to Copenhagen and to share our concerns.

Youth meeting with Minister Wong and Department of Climate Change (that's me on the far left!)

It was an impressive program and seeing the work laid out by the Department made me fully appreciate just how far they have come since their inception just two years ago! But, there was nothing I heard today that made me think, phew, it’s ok, they’ve got our back.

While we’ve seen other countries, like the European Union ratchet up their level of ambition with the recent announcement of a 2050 target of a 95% emission reduction target (in the context of a global deal), Australia continues to lack the level of ambitious thinking and strong leadership that not just the science, but the youth of Australia demand. (Check my brief overview of some of the policy areas we covered at the end of this blog.)

There has been A LOT of talk about a so called lack of political will in the climate debate: read politicians don’t think taking strong action on climate change is palatable to the people who vote them in. So, despite the science, they just don’t ‘have the space’ to make the needed commitments.

Well, I must say, I disagree.

Tomorrow tens of thousands of people, from more than 170 countries will come together to create over 4, 000 events.

Together we will show world leaders the will they have been looking for.

Saturday 24 October will go down in history as the people of the world declare their support for the most important number – 350.

High in the Andes in Bolivia, Indigenous Aymara shamans will hold a ceremony where Chacaltaya, the first South American glacier to completely disappear, vanished earlier this year. 350 cyclists will ride through the streets of Beijing to an eco-hip hop event that will be broadcast around the world. Just a week after President Nasheed of the Maldives held an underwater cabinet meeting calling for world leaders to commit to 350, hundreds of Maldivian citizens will hold a 24 hour underwater relay. Right across the globe, our international team of 12 trackers will each be at events in our own countries.

Here in Sydney I will be joining with hundreds of Australians on the steps of the Opera House to create one of the global ‘3’s which will later join a ‘5’ and ‘0’ created in other country’s to spell out our message. If you’re there, come say hi, I’ll be the one with 350 painted on my face!

If you’re not a Sydney-sider, no doubt there is an event near you. Check out this extensive and exciting list.

Tomorrow morning I am sure I wont need the caffeine hit I did at 4:30am this morning, I will be alive with the buzz of the day!

Tomorrow the world will show our leaders that across the globe, we are here, we are informed, and we want strong action NOW!

Tomorrow we will show them that we will accept nothing less than a fair, ambitious and binding global climate agreement in Copenhagen.

See you there. And then, make sure you do everything you possibly can to ensure your MP knows that you were there.

Cara

And for the policy die-hards, a brief overview of some of the key elements out of today’s Departmental and Ministerial meeting.

Ambition of 2020 reduction targets: while the Government have said that they will reduce emissions by -5% no matter what, they will only reduce emissions by -25% (which is waaay below what science demands) in the context of a global deal.

Finance: Australia has stated numerous times, that they recognise that finance is a central issue to the UN climate talks, but they continue to remain tight lipped about how much they think is needed, where is should come from, and how it should be spent.

With such little time to go, and finance being a clear blockage in the talks, this silence needs to be broken. Lots of other countries (including Mexico, Norway, Tuvalu, the UK, EU and USA) have put proposals on the table, none provide a magic answer but at least they give us something to work with. It’s time for Australian to weigh in on this vital issue.

Adaptation (helping developing countries to cope with the impacts of climate change they are already facing): This is one area that the Australian delegation feel is progressing quite well, and I largely agree with them.

There continues to be a good recognition of the need for the world’s most vulnerable countries and peoples to be prioritised. However, until there is a clear signal about financing, this work can never be realised. Adaptation, no matter how well planned, will never be free.

Legal form (or architecture) of the global climate agreement: The Australian government have put forward a proposal that they are calling the ‘schedules approach’. Basically it’s a table with a number of rows and columns which is designed to capture the actions that different countries are taking on climate change (eg. Their emission reduction target and the actions they will take to reach it).

The approach is designed to be flexible – that is capture the varying activities from a variety of countries; durable – one single tool which will help the world to see who is doing what and will be able to be used continuously over coming years as it provides room for countries to increase their ambition; and to provide certainty – that is, we will be able to see what kind of global outcome it will deliver and in theory it will be able to provide greater market certainty.

The approach is designed to be able to bring countries who have different responsibilities and capabilities like South Africa and Australia, China and the US, into the one agreement without meaning that they all have to do the same kind of actions. Australia and the US would take on economy wide binding targets, and South Africa and China would be expected to take on nationally tailored mitigation actions.

There are a lot of elements of this that just make good sense, and I do applaud the Australian government for putting a significant amount of work into an area that had otherwise been left largely out in the cold in the ‘too hard basket.’ But, I do worry that while this is a good tool, it is not enough to up the political will of stronger action, nor will it provide penalties on developed countries who fail to deliver on what they have promised.

So, as you can see it’s not all bad. But, what we have right now is not the planet saving deal we are demanding. Lots more work to do. Maybe I will need that coffee after all.

Sexta à noite e nada para festejar

Então, é isso. Mais uma etapa rumo a Copenhague foi cumprida, mas não vejo nenhum motivo para comemorar (a não ser o fato de a Noruega ter anunciado ontem que vai reduzir suas emissões em 40% até 2020, baseado nos níveis de 1990 – primeiro país que se aproximou dos números recomendados pela ciência). Houve avanço nos textos de negociação, mas assuntos cruciais para um acordo bem-sucedido em Copenhague como, por exemplo, um comprometimento sério por parte dos países desenvolvidos sobre a redução de emissões de gases de efeito estufa a médio (2020) e longo prazo (2050) ainda não aconteceu. Há alguns números na mesa, mas tudo permanece nebuloso e todos os números estão condicionados à ação de outros países. Os negociadores alegam que estão seguindo instruções e que decisões desse tipo têm que ser tomadas pelos seus chefes.

Por que comemorar? Source: Dreamstime.com

Durante essa rodada de negociações, ficou claro também que os países desenvolvidos estão dispostos a abrir mão de uma conquista da Convenção: o Protocolo de Quioto. Argumentam que a luta contra as mudanças climáticas tem que ser reforçada por um acordo que abrigue todos os países, ou seja, como sabem que o Congresso norte-americano não vai ratificar o Protocolo ou qualquer acordo parecido, querem pegar carona com os Estados Unidos e regular domesticamente (sem amparo de um tratado internacional) a redução de emissão de gases de efeito estufa (proposta australiana). Isso é muito perigoso e um passo para trás gigantesco. Quem acredita que abandonando Quioto vão se comprometer com um acordo mais ambicioso como dizem? Eu não. É uma situação muito delicada porque é compreensível que os outros países desenvolvidos exijam ação dos Estados Unidos que seja comparável aos seus esforços, já que ele é o maior emissor do mundo, mas, ao mesmo tempo, não podemos esquecer que essa discussão não tem cabimento nenhum nesse momento. Como disse a Indonésia hoje: “podemos negociar sobre o clima, mas não podemos negociar com o clima e pedir mais tempo”.

Hoje, eu “twittei” ao vivo das sessões plenárias. Se clicar aqui e aqui, pode ver tudo o que aconteceu!

Foram duas semanas intensas: durante o dia, no centro de conferência participando de reuniões de todos os tipos, à noite (e de madrugada), no lobby do hotel, escrevendo para o blog (sofrendo com a internet super lenta e com o único CD que toca repetidamente o dia inteiro – adivinhem o que estou ouvindo agora?). Participar dessas reuniões consome muito de todos nós (pelo menos dos que estão preocupados com o nosso futuro – quero acreditar que é a maioria das pessoas) porque acabamos dedicando todo o nosso tempo ao trabalho e queremos fazer tudo o que for possível da melhor maneira possível (deixando sono e refeições no último plano). É muito cansativo e no momento estou tão angustiada por ver o tempo passando e nada de animador acontecendo que, apesar de ser sexta-feira à noite e não ter que trabalhar amanhã, sinto-me no dever de deixar uma última mensagem para quem me acompanhou nessas últimas duas semanas.

Está na hora de esforços sobre-humanos por parte de todos se queremos ver um acordo justo e ambicioso em Copenhague!

Está na hora de todos nós exigirmos ações de nossos governantes!

Está na hora de surgirem verdadeiros líderes (não só em discursos…)!

Até Barcelona!

P.S.: Deixem seus comentários, sugestões, perguntas para nossos negociadores, enfim, sintam-se à vontade para falar comigo.

Speaking for just 90 seconds we gave our demands to the delegates for OUR futures.

Our UK tracker Anna Collins, and Rishi Bhandary from Nepal delivered this speech with passion.

We want to share it with you. We hope you enjoy it – and that these words can continue to inspire action. (Due to UNFCCC regulations, we couldn’t film this wonderful moment, but professional video footage to come soon!)

Rishi and Anna: "the youth are leading, will you follow?"

Delegates, you will remember 6 months ago we asked you how old you will be in 2050?

You seemed to notice, you responded, you bought the t shirt. But this did not translate into action.

My name is Rishi and I hope to be 64 In the year 2050.

Earlier this week, we declared “no confidence” on the road to Copenhagen.

The process has been hijacked by carbon cowboys looking to profit from this crisis; our future is being held hostage to the self-interested dirty delaying tactics of Annex 1 countries.

We have seen the arrogant betrayal of Kyoto Protocol commitments, with the perverse idea that developing countries should or can somehow act first.

History will judge you.

We witness the US deliberately undermine the negotiations by introducing language to merge the Kyoto Protocol and convention processes, tearing out compliance and top-down target setting.

Other Annex 1 countries hide behind the US to avoid their responsibilities; setting disgracefully low targets; with deceptive offset measures that amount to no real emissions cuts at all.

We will not accept a dirty deal.

– - – - – - – - –

(Anna)

Our stand is clear. Let Norway’s commitment of 40% on 1990 levels by 2020 be the minimum benchmark for real emission cuts, but with no offsets, Indigenous rights based language secured before any discussion of REDD, recognition of climate debt, and targets of 350 ppm and 1.5 degrees Celsius.

History will judge you.

While governments are cautiously calculating their commitments based on what they believe is possible, the youth respectfully remind them that throughout history, political forces can shift rapidly when people rally together for change.

As one of the youngest people in this room, I will spend my life with the decisions you make today.

We have an opportunity to make some of the most profound and positive changes in the history of mankind.

Lets start acting like it.

Young people around the world are doing just that, organizing in our communities locally, nationally, and internationally, and we find our hope for the future in our movements.

We ask, will you join us? It is not too late to do your part.

The youth are leading, please follow.

Because History will judge this.