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Mexico gets kudos for climate summit success

The World — Thu, 23 Dec 2010 21:00:34 +0000

Mexico played host to the latest round of international climate negotiations earlier this month. And the country’s foreign minister is widely credited with getting the process back on track and moving ahead. Among those praising Mexico’s leadership is Durwood Zaelke. He’s president of the Institute for Governance & Sustainable Development in Washington. Anchor Marco Werman speaks to him about Mexico’s role in the negotiations. Download MP3

Copenhagen aftermath

The World — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 22:04:56 +0000

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The outcome of the Copenhagen climate summit has disappointed many and now the blame game is in full swing. Britain’s Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, says the summit was held to ransom by a small number of countries. One of his ministers has accused China of blocking major agreements at Copenhagen. China insists it was already doing a lot to deal with global warming. Marco Werman talks with The World’s environment editor Peter Thomson

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MARCO WERMAN: I’m Marco Werman, this is The World, a co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH in Boston. The reviews are in and most give thumbs down on the Copenhagen climate summit. The critics include Britain’s Prime Minister. Gordon Brown called the non-binding agreement at best flawed, at worst chaotic. His government accused China of blocking major agreements. China responded that it’s already doing a lot to deal with global warming. One of the more positive assessments of the summit came from its Danish hosts; they called it better than nothing. The World’s Environment Editor Peter Thomson is back from Copenhagen. Better than nothing Peter? Is that the best that can be said?

PETER THOMSON: Well even President Obama who was the catalyst in brokering this agreement said that it was insufficient, far insufficient to meet the task and really just a first step. So there really is a sense even from those who made the final agreement happen that it’s far less than we need, far less than they hoped for.

MARCO: Now you mentioned the one thing that was actually put back in, into the final draft of the agreement that you had not heard until actually today, right?

PETER: Yeah. Well I mean this document has been in play since well into the last week and even over the weekend I was looking at what I thought was the final version of it and then this morning I come in and I look at the UNFCCC’s, the UN’s official final version and it’s got an interesting number back in there that had not been in there over the weekend.

MARCO: What is that?

PETER: That is one point five degrees Celsius. It says at the top of this document that we recognize that the science says that we should try and keep global temperatures under a rise of two degrees Celsius as the threshold for dangerous climate change. At the end of the document, previous versions had said we should reassess that in a bit and maybe think about one point five. That was out of what I thought was the final version. Now it’s back in and the final version says that we should look in the future to come back and look at this temperature threshold of a one point five degree rise and that’s really crucial because a lot of the least developed countries, the countries that are most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, are saying we have to hold global temperatures to one point five degree rise. And they were some of the ones who were the most critical of this accord. So that’s back in and that’s interesting.

MARCO: That half a degree Celsius would make a huge difference for countries that are low lying like Vanuatu and Tuvalu who are facing sea rises.

PETER: Sure. Nobody knows exactly what it’s going to mean but certainly I mean, even that what sounds like a small difference, half a degree Celsius could be life and death.

MARCO: Now top British officials used words like chaotic and farcical even to describe the talks in Copenhagen. How did it feel for you on the conference floor?

PETER: Well sure as has heck chaotic. I mean all weeklong I arrived on Monday and from the get go when it took me six hours just to get into the building and I was lucky. There were colleagues of mine, journalists accredited who didn’t, who sat in line for ten hours outdoors and did not get in; to Friday when talks seemed on the verge of collapse we had all this back and forth between Obama and Premier Wen of China. Nobody knew what was going to come out of it and then finally about 9:00 in the evening after the official program was supposed to have finished by noon, we have word that Obama has brokered this deal and we hear about how it happened. We hear that maybe he burst into this meeting of China and Brazil and India, or maybe he was invited, nobody really knows. And all of that is sort of off the official program. The official program is supposed to be 192 countries negotiating stuff together, and what we have actually is like the world’s biggest players going off into a back room someplace and hammering something out, and ultimately getting this agreement between the two biggest players which are the US and China which had seemed totally out of reach just hours before.

MARCO: It does seem kind of crazy there on the floor. One thing that you know we might have forgotten in all of the discussion of the treaty and agreements, is that there is kind of a trade show quality to this with a lot of green activists and people selling stuff on the sides and countries having their booths in a convention center.

PETER: Yeah I mean nobody was actually selling stuff per se but there was a whole section that was devoted to NGOs and business and countries to sort of promote their position and their technology. It was, it really did have a trade show feel to it. And then of course there were the country delegation offices, which were off in another whole other side of the building. And an interesting thing is that every country had one office for their delegation, except for the United States, which had two. And this really came back to the crux of the problem to a large degree, was the split between our administration and our congress. The administration has certain goals, congress has been reluctant to go along with them.

MARCO: And you really mean that Congress had a booth and the White House had a booth.

PETER: Yeah. They weren’t booths they were offices.

MARCO: I see, okay.

PETER: They were delegation offices. And that was something that a lot of people remarked on, yeah.

MARCO: So the key question is what happens next, Peter. There are talks slated for Bonn in Germany next summer then again in Mexico City a year from now. What are the goals?

PETER: Well I mean there’s a lot going on here and the talks in Bonn and Mexico City are part of this official Kyoto UN framework convention on climate change process that continues even though this document did not actually have sort of the force of their stamp of approval coming out of that. They will attempt, you know to continue the dialogue, move things forward. But there are important things that are going to happen before then. One is that this document, the Copenhagen Accord has this annex that countries have to submit their national plans for emissions reductions by January 31^st of 2010, just a month, a little more than a month from now, and that’s a key thing that the US got these countries to agree to, China and India in particular was to put on paper for the rest of the world to see these are the things to which we are committing. That has to be done by January 31^st. That’s very important. It’s important in part because it’s going to pressure the Senate and part of, a lot of what was going on here was an effort to essentially assuage the concerns of the Senate that China and India were not going to commit to real reductions in their emissions and to oversight. There’s also a provision in here for oversight of those developing countries, those large developing countries’ economies. And that is also starting to be in progress. So this is in some ways all aimed at the Senate in Washington. And John Kerry has promised coming out of this meeting that he will push through a bill in Washington to commit the US to hard targets for carbon reduction. So we have the official Copenhagen UN process, we have the US process in Washington, those are on different tracks but they have to converge. And that’s kind of what people are hoping will come out of this is that Obama has somehow managed to put it on a track for those two to converge and only then do we really get progress.

MARCO: We’ll see where these two tracks end up. The World’s Environment Editor Peter Thomson just back from Copenhagen thanks a lot.

PETER: Thanks Marco.

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Copenhagen climate conference

The World — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 11:00:38 +0000

China and Indonesia have hailed the Copenhagen UN climate summit outcome, despite its cool reception from aid agencies and campaigners. Beijing’s foreign minister said it was a new beginning, and Indonesia’s leader said he was pleased with the result. The Chairman of Friends of the Earth International, Nnimmo Bassey, called the summit “an abject failure. By delaying action, rich countries have condemned millions of the world’s poorest people to hunger, suffering and loss of life as climate change accelerates.”

Copenhagen deal reaction in quotes

President Barack Obama defended the accord he helped broker with China and other main powers. The non-binding pact, called the Copenhagen Accord, was not adopted by consensus at the summit in Denmark. Instead, after two weeks of frantic negotiations, the 193-nation conference ended on Dec 19th with delegates merely taking note of the deal. At the end of the conference President Obama described the accord as a “meaningful and unprecedented breakthrough” but said much work was still be needed to reach a legally binding treaty.

Key points of Copenhagen Accord

Dec 21: Summit aftermath
Marco Werman discusses with our environment editor Peter Thomson where global efforts to combat climate change stand after the Copenhagen summit.
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Evolution of the accord: some of the Copenhagen drafts (pdf):

Draft 1
Draft 2
Draft 3
Draft 4
Draft 5
Near final draft

UN’s Copenhagen Climate Summit homepage with final version of the “Copenhagen Accord”

In his address to the conference, the President had called on world leaders to come together to strike a deal on the final day of the two-week UN climate summit in Copenhagen.

Video of President Obama’s full address to the climate conference

Coverage on The World:

Dec 18: “meaningful agreement”
Marco Werman talks with The World’s environment editor Peter Thomson about the deal reached in Copenhagen.
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Dec 17: deadlock continues
World leaders remain deadlocked on a host of issues just a day before the Copenhagen climate summit is scheduled to end. Anchor Marco Werman gets an update from The World’s environment editor Peter Thomson, who is in Copenhagen.
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Peter Thomson’s photos from the Copenhagen summit

Dec 17: China in Copenhagen
China has resisted calls for it to agree to binding verifiable targets for reducing emissions. But people in China say their government should be willing to make a commitment in Copenhagen. The World’s Mary Kay Magistad reports from Beijing.
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Dec 16: Time running out
Chances are growing slim that world representatives meeting in Copenhagen will come up with a deal on climate change. The World’s Peter Thomson reports on chaos at the conference.
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Demonstrators march toward the Bella Center where the UN climate summit is taking place (Photo: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

Dec 16: climate deal still possible?
Anchor Marco Werman speaks with former US climate negotiator Kathleen McGinty. She was a member of the U.S. delegation to the Kyoto climate summit back in 1997. She says a climate agreement is still possible in Copenhagen.
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Dec 16: Climate change in Peru
Climate change is having an effect on agriculture in Peru. Farmers in the Peruvian mountains are adapting to rising temperatures by planting at higher and higher elevations. Jon Beaupre reports.
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Illustrated transcript of this story

Dec 16: Parsing global climate change polls
Have you ever wondered why two polls on climate change, both done by credible organizations and both asking not dissimilar questions, can come up with strikingly different results? Science journalist Dan Grossman tried to find out from political scientist Richard Worthington.

Read Dan’s blog from Copenhagen

Dec 15: Climate change and the oceans
During the conference, Peter Thomson had the chance to talk with Margaret Caldwell, director of the Environmental and Natural Resources Law and Policy Program at Stanford University, about the impact of increasing greenhouse gas emissions on the oceans. Despite being a major part of the climate system, oceans are not on the agenda at the conference.
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Dec 14: Crunch time in Copenhagen
There’s little time left for climate negotiators at the conference in Copenhagen. The summit has less than a week to go. Anchor Marco Werman speaks with The World’s environment editor Peter Thomson, who is in the Danish capital to cover the summit.
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Dec 14: Climate migrants in Bangladesh
Scientists say droughts, floods and rising seas could drive millions of so-called climate migrants from their homes by later this century.
Floods have already been a very real problem in low-lying Bangladesh. Joanna Kakissis reports from southwestern Bangladesh.
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Dan Grossman’s Copenhagen blog
Science reporter Daniel Grossman is in Copenhagen to cover the climate summit. He is also blogging for The World: in his first entry, Daniel describes a visit to an unassuming, but very eco-friendly dwelling just outside the Danish capital.
Daniel Grossman’s Copenhagen blog

Impact of climate change
As world leaders gather in Copenhagen for the Climate Change Summit 2009, BBC reporters have traveled the globe to see the impact of the issue on people and the places they live in:
View the interactive map with BBC video reports

Dec 11: EU pledge to climate fund
The European Union has pledged $ 10.5 billion over three years to help developed nations deal with climate change. Now it’s looking to other big polluters, like the US and China, to make a contribution. The World’s Gerry Hadden reports.
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Dec 11: Canada’s rush toward energy reform
The Canadian province of Ontario has embraced renewable energy. But the province’s headlong rush into solar, geothermal and wind power has angered some residents. Anita Elash reports.
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Dec 10: Underground energy concerns
To produce cleaner energy, companies and governments are looking underground. That’s got project neighbors worried. The World’s Gerry Hadden reports from Landau, Germany.
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Chief Engineer Joerg Baumgaertner and Geox CEO Branka Rogulic at their geothermal power station. This plant provides enough power for about 6,000 homes. (Photo: Gerry Hadden)

More pictures for this story

Dec 9: Conflict in Copenhagen
There has been tension at the Copenhagen climate summit – but it wasn’t a dispute between industrialized countries and developing nations. Developing nations started arguing among themselves. Anchor Marco Werman talks the BBC’s environmental correspondent, Richard Black.
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Richard Black’s ‘Earth Watch’ blog

Dec 9: Campaigning for Kiribati
Anchor Marco Werman speaks with Alex Randall, a volunteer with the group UN-fair-Play. He’s in Copenhagen to help small countries with environmental concerns get heard at the summit.
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Dec 9: Paris heat wave offers lessons on climate change
In 2003, Europe was hit by a major heat wave. It caused the death of about 1,200 people in Paris. Now the city is trying to learn from that tragedy, as it plans for the kind of extreme temperatures climate change could bring. Reporter Daniel Grossman has the story.
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Daniel Grossman’s Copenhagen blog

Dec 8: Assessing India’s green energy promises
As climate negotiators huddle in Copenhagen, India is promising to reduce its greenhouse emissions with a big boost in green energy. But as Miranda Kennedy reports, there are big question marks as to whether India can deliver.
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Dec 8: Climate activists get creative
Activists are staging creative demonstrations at the climate change summit in Copenhagen. The World’s Marina Giovannelli looks at how different protest groups are vying for a spot on the international stage, and whether or not their efforts will sway the outcome of the negotiations.
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Dec 7: Pride v practicality in India’s climate stance
India is resisting steep binding cuts in greenhouse emissions. Reporter Miranda Kennedy tells us why.
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Dec 4: Climate science fracas
The United Nations is conducting an investigation into claims that British scientists manipulated data on global warming to support their argument that it’s man made. The World’s Laura Lynch has the story.
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Dec 4: China and US jockey on climate
China is set to play a big role at next week’s climate talks in Copenhagen. Anchor Marco Werman speaks with Orville Schell of the Asia Society Center on U.S.-China Relations, about the steps China is taking to clean up the environment, and its image.
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From the BBC:

Other weblinks:

“Meaningful agreement” in Copenhagen

The World — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 21:40:43 +0000

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President Barack Obama said on Friday that a “meaningful and unprecedented breakthrough” had been reached among the US, China, and three other countries on a global effort to curb climate change but said much work was still be needed to reach a legally binding treaty. The President had earlier called on world leaders to come together to strike a deal on the final day of the UN climate summit in Copenhagen. The World’s environment editor Peter Thomson is in Copenhagen.

MARCO WERMAN: I’m Marco Werman. This is The World. It’s been a hectic day at the Copenhagen climate summit for President Obama. Early on the president urged delegates to reach an agreement on how to combat climate change even, he said, if it’s an imperfect agreement. Mr. Obama may have gotten his wish. Just as the climate summit was about to close a US official told reporters that President Obama has reached a meaningful agreement with other world leaders and that official said the agreement is not sufficient to fight climate change but is an important first step. The World’s environment editor Peter Thomson is there at the summit in Copenhagen. Peter what are you hearing about this agreement? What makes it meaningful?

PETER THOMSON: Well we just don’t know. And in fact I’m not sure that anybody who was in the room with the president when he announced that knows. My understanding is it was just a small pool of White House reporters with the president and I’m not sure that any details were given to them and those details that they got are sort of only slowly washing across the conference center here in Copenhagen.

WERMAN: And any sense about how it’s going to kind of jive with the two degree Celsius level that everybody’s looking at?

THOMSON: Well I’ll tell you if the deal they’re talking about now reflects at all the latest draft of the accord that I’ve seen not very well. The previous drafts were pretty weak. This is even weaker. And again this was the latest draft that I saw and it could be out the window by now. But it even … . It mentioned two degrees as the target not to exceed that in terms of total warming over an undetermined amount of time. But it didn’t give a timeline for that. And it didn’t give any particular targets for how to achieve that. So they’re saying meaningful. What we’re seeing here is a little less meaningful.

WERMAN: What else happened today in Copenhagen Peter that led up to this kind of unofficial announcement of a meaningful agreement? There was a lot of stuff happening behind closed doors.

THOMSON: Oh there sure was. And I mean you said a minute ago that this agreement came just as the meeting was about to close. The meeting was actually supposed to close many hours ago. They were supposed to wrap things up this morning Copenhagen time and have this sort of big handshake and picture taking session and signing ceremony and everything this afternoon. That’s long gone. All that’s been canceled. People have been running around. Meetings have been being held behind closed doors. Other things have been cancelled. Just a moment ago as I was waiting to come on here I heard that the EU was holding a press conference. It’s the first press conference that we’ve actually heard announced today that’s going to be held as scheduled. And the EU obviously is a very significant player here so stuff is popping right now. And we are well past the deadline. The big issues are verification. The US is determined to get China and other developing countries to provide verification for the emissions cuts that they say they are going to make and to make sure that the international community can count on those being made. It’s the old Ronald Reagan term trust but verify. The administration is dead set on that and the Chinese are dead set against it. They say that’s a violation of their sovereignty. But they are making small moves in terms of talking about increased transparency and better means of communication and the like.

WERMAN: And Peter apparently Barack Obama and Wen Jiabao, the Chinese premiere, met twice today. Do have any sense of what was going on in those meetings?

THOMSON: Well nobody really knows for sure but apparently Wen Jiabao was fairly upset by some of the language that President Obama used in his speech to the assembly today on that question of verification and took some offense at it. And it seems that it took two meetings to work out that diplomatic snafu. Exactly where they came out of it we don’t know but we are hearing that China is party to this new agreement that also involves Brazil and South Africa and the US. Now obviously those are only four players. Three of them are quite big players. But it doesn’t involve everybody yet.

WERMAN: Peter with just a few seconds to go, give us the mood right now as delegates in Copenhagen wait for some announcement.

THOMSON: Well I think there’s a sense of the sort of increase chaos. It’s been chaotic all week but things are suddenly just picking up and nobody knows what’s going on but everybody knows something is going on. There’s this incredible anticipation but I think there’s also an expectation that what ever does happen it’s still going to be a very, very weak document coming out of here.

WERMAN: The World’s environment editor Peter Thomson at the summit in Copenhagen. We’ll stay in touch. Thanks a lot Peter.

THOMSON: Thank you Marco.

Climate deal might have to wait

The World — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 21:38:53 +0000

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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has told the Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen that the US was prepared to work toward mobilizing $100 billion a year for developing countries to help them deal with climate change. The announcement comes as doubts grow over whether the summit will achieve its declared goals of agreeing cuts in emissions, and deciding on how much rich countries should pay to assist developing countries. The summit has entered its final two days and there are still major differences of opinion. The World’s environment editor Peter Thomson is in Copenhagen.

Copenhagen police battle climate talks protesters

The World — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 21:36:57 +0000

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Police have forced back hundreds of protesters who tried to break through a perimeter fence at the UN climate summit in Copenhagen. Activists have been angered by lack of progress on a new climate deal and also by restrictions on access to the talks. Inside the conference, Wednesday’s “high-level” session was delayed when several developing countries protested about procedural issues. The World’s environment editor Peter Thomson reports from the Copenhagen summit. (Photo: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

All of our coverage of Copenhagen 2009
Environment stories on The World
Offical Copenhagen webcast
BBC photos from Copenhagen

MARCO WERMAN: I’m Marco Werman. This is the World. It was a raucous day at the global climate summit in Copenhagen. Danish police fired pepper spray at protesters outside the conference venue. Meanwhile disputes inside left major issues unresolved. The president of the European Commission said he was disappointed with the lack of progress toward a climate treaty and time is running out. The meeting ends in two days. The World’s Peter Thomson is at the conference and has this report.

PETER THOMSON: The climate of the climate talks here in Copenhagen has been growing more acrimonious. Delegates of poor nations staged a sort of work stoppage earlier in the week. Rifts have been deepening between key players, including the US and China. Meetings and events are being cancelled without explanation. And then there are the protesters. Many of them have been squeezed out of the meeting site as the UN tightens security with the arrival of scores of government ministers and heads of state. In the snow outside the conference center this morning, a small group of observer delegates who say they’ve been barred from the conference site burned their credentials in protest. Seno Tsuhah was among them. She came here to represent thousands of farmers in India.

SENO TSUHAH: We are burning our badges because we are angry, to show our anger, that we want to tell the world that there should be no legitimacy without communities’ voices.

THOMSON: The mood was no less angry inside. Just beyond the first security gates, delegates from Friends of the Earth International sat on the floor, saying they’d been denied access to the meeting hall itself. Nnimmo Bassey, who came here from Nigeria, is Friends of the Earth’s chair.

NNIMMO BASSEY: We all have badges, we have secondary badges and were are all expecting to go in and we’ve been stopped.

THOMSON: Have they given you a reason?

BASSEY: The reason is security, and I don’t know what that means. We believe it’s not just, it’s not right and it should not be tolerated.

THOMSON: Some of the demonstrations and sloganeering had a sort of pro-forma, pre-packaged feel to them and it’s possible that a good number of such supposedly spontaneous outbursts were planned long ago. But the concern that this meeting could lead to no agreement, or to an agreement that falls far short of what’s needed, isn’t limited to protesters. Many delegates, scientists, and long-time observers of the treaty process fear the summit could end up being a failure. Now, with two days left, many who’ve been most deeply involved in pushing for dramatic action are dramatically scaling back their expectations, and talking about it as just another meeting. Elliot Diringer is with the Pew Center on Global Climate Change.

ELLIOT DIRINGER: I think that an outcome here is very likely to be disappointing in some respects to everyone who feels the need to move forward urgently. But it’s the process we have. We have to look to it to deliver as much as possible.

THOMSON: It’s possible that with President Obama and more than 100 other world leaders arriving in the next 24 hours, things could quickly change. But Diringer and others say that even if Copenhagen doesn’t produce an agreement on climate change, they hope it moves the world a little further in that direction. For The World, I’m Peter Thomson, in Copenhagen

Climate change in Peru

The World — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 21:35:42 +0000

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World leaders have begun to arrive at the climate summit in Copenhagen. But deep divisions between rich and poor nations continue to threaten to derail the negotiations. The US says it doesn’t expect to offer any further cuts in its carbon emissions. And developing countries accuse industrialized nations of going back on their commitment to fight climate change. The consequences of failure would have a global impact, from the world’s mountains to its jungles. Peru is a country that has both. John Beaupre tells us that the South American nation is feeling the effects of climate change from top to bottom. Claes Andreaason contributed to this report. <

Marcelino Cruz

Reporter: 10,000 feet up in the Peruvian Andes, the gray skies over Copa Grande are suddenly lit by magnificent lightning, followed by a deep rumble. And a light rain. It’s the beginning of the rainy season, and the village’s five hundred residents are happy to see it. The rain is essential for their crops of potatoes, wheat, corn and beans. But people here say it doesn’t rain as much as it used to. Marcelino Cruz takes a break from turning the soil in one of his corn fields.

Cruz: “There used to be more rain in the past. These days, it seems as if it’s escaping.”

Reporter: It’s not much better during the dry season. Between the months of May and September, Cruz and his neighbors get their water from the nearby Copa Glacier. But temperatures here have been rising, and the glacier is rapidly diminishing. Over his 34 years, Cruz says the glacier has retreated about a mile and a quarter. The lack of water has affected production, Cruz says. Yields from his farm have decreased by forty percent in the last decade.

Cruz:“And it’s not just the water. We also have new pests. And frost – something we never used to have.”

Copa Glacier (photo: Kate Dunbar)

Reporter: Cruz is seeing the effects of what researchers have confirmed–that his small part of the world is experiencing a significant shift in its climate. The effects of climate change are also being felt a day’s journey away, at the edge of the Amazon jungle. That’s where a long and slim balsa takes us across the Marañon River to Yamayaka – to meet with Simon Wipe Bejus, a leader of the Awajun. It’s a steamy, 100 degrees or so here. Bejus is dressed in a headband of beans and feathers, with wide belts of red, white and black beans crossing his chest .

Bejus: “The climate is changing, The rain is scarce and the sun feels like three times what it used to be. The mountains are getting drier. And the River is much smaller. It really worries us here in the Amazon.”

Reporter: The Awajun grow plantains, yucca, maize and rice. But as in Copa up in the mountains, Bejus says their traditional lifestyle here is threatened.

Bejus:“The jungle is our market. Nature is our pharmacy. But with climate change, mining, oil exploration and illegal deforestation, the Amazon is getting polluted.”

Huancayo potato market

Maria Scurrah: This is another one, Paseña from Huancavelica. Loved in the market for its purple color…

Reporter: 400 miles away in Huancayo, plant breeder and pathologist Maria Scurrah guides me through the potato market. Peru is the birthplace of the potato, and the plentitude at the market is just a fraction of the thousands of varieties of potatoes grown here.

Scurrah: You can see that they native varieties are easy to tell because, you can see that plant breeders go for big, round, no eyes. Whereas the ancient varieties are the opposite; small, shriveled and deep eyes.

Reporter: Scurrah says that lately, Peru’s potato farmers have had to adjust to their changing climate :

Scurrah: “Well, one of the key adaptations that the farmers in the Andes are doing is really climbing up with their crops – only ten years ago you wouldn’t have seen a crop above 4,000 (meters) and those are all the bitter potatoes that are frost tolerant. And the top potatoes would have been at 3,900 (meters) – and now it’s very common to find crops at 4,200 (meters).”

Reporter: Growing potatoes at above 13,000 feet used to be unheard of. But Scurrah says there is a limit.

Scurrah: “As the globe heats up, people move up with their crops until the edge of what used to be highland pastures, not agriculture, And they will have nowhere to go after reaching that top line.”

Reporter: Peru itself is responsible for only about half a percent of all greenhouse gas pollution. But as climate change begins to affect life all over the country, the Peruvian government has adopted an ambitious plan to fight it. The goal is to decrease the country’s emissions by 47 percent by 2020. And to stop net deforestation in the Amazon entirely in just ten years as well. Eduardo Durand runs the government’s special agency for climate change.

Durand: “The reduction has to be very aggressive and very important in the first twenty years.”

Reporter: Durand believes Peru’s goals… and those of much of the rest of the world… can – and must be met:

Durand: “Otherwise we will have a very serious situation, and a very high cost of adaptation in the long term. So it’s better for everybody – developed and developing countries – to have a very bold and ambitious goal of reduction in the next step up until 2020.”

Reporter: Back up in Copa Grande, Marcelino Cruz is getting ready for the night shift as a guard at a rose plantation . Like many other farmers here, Cruz needs the extra income to support his family. Moving his farm somewhere else is not an alternative, he says. They probably don’t have enough water either. But as the climate continues to change, here. Cruz says he doubts own children will be able to stay in Copa Grande:

Cruz: “I hope my children will get a good education and get a job somewhere else. These fields will not be able to support them.”

Climate activists get creative

The World — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 21:37:28 +0000

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PHOTO: ATTILA KISBENEDEK/AFP/Getty Images

Activists are planning both theatrical and confrontational demonstrations for Copenhagen. Protesters are bidding for media attention, but it’s unlikely they will significantly sway the outcome of the climate negotiations. The World’s Marina Giovannelli reports on how some protest groups are vying for a spot on the international stage.

MARCO WERMAN: They’re already beating the drums and shouting the slogans in Copenhagen. Demonstrators are pressing for strong action at the international climate change summit. The World’s Marina Giovannelli introduces us to some of the activists.

MARINA GIOVANNELLI: Gary Anderson is a member of the Institute for the Art and Practice of Dissent at Home.

GARY ANDERSON: The institute is myself, my partner, and our three children, Neal, age 9, Gabriel, age 7, and Sid age 2.

GIOVANNELLI: In a few days, the Anderson family will board a train to Copenhagen to perform on the street. Gary Anderson plans to speak though a megaphone while standing on a small platform.

ANDERSON: We employ the baby steps our two year old uses to visit the toilet on and we make our political speeches from this particular baby step.

GIOVANNELLI: Anderson’s family will be joining a multitude of activists and other interested parties. Many have already premiered their acts. One of them is Mohamad Shinaz who’s from the Maldives. He stood in a tank of dirty water, which symbolized rising sea levels.

MOHAMAD SHINAZ: And today when I’m in this tank, I feel the same thing. It’s really horrible. I think everybody should work to save the world.

GIOVANNELLI: All these activists know that for the next two weeks the eyes and cameras of the world will be on Copenhagen. But will the activism influence the climate talks? Dana Fisher at Columbia University says that for the most part, the activists’ street theatre is all about getting attention.

DANA FISHER: They will certainly be successful at that. If the purpose is to sway the negotiations there is not a lot of support for argument that it will be successful.

GIOVANNELLI: The protestors may not influence the negotiations, but Copenhagen is a big stage and protestors plan to use it. Fisher says all that attention could backfire.

FISHER: They may lose sympathy, particularly if you see protestors doing bad things, it’s never really good for the general public’s sympathy.

GIOVANNELLI: But some groups aren’t interested in that. One is Climate Justice Action, an international coalition of environmental groups. Chris Kitchen is with the coalition. He says it’s planning a mass civil action next week, aimed at temporarily halting talks, at a climactic point.

CHRIS KITCHEN: So the action will involve lots of people coming from the outside and approaching the conference area, and we’ve said we are going to get into the UN area itself, and the way we are describing this is a confrontational, non-violent, civil disobedience action.

GIOVANNELLI: Of course things don’t always stay non-violent, as protestors of big international meetings in Seattle, London, and Genoa can attest to. But many people n Copenhagen will be simply spending their time on the world stage playing their cameos in a peaceful way. That’ll certainly be the case with Gary Anderson. There’s nothing violent about how Anderson, his partner and their three kids, will be delivering their message.

ANDERSON: I think that at the heart of all of this is that we recognize as a family our role in climate injustice and we feel that that’s where we need to focus. Maybe it’s time for us to be misbehaving; maybe it’s time for us to be naughty as a family.

GIOVANNELLI: Not violent, but maybe a little deviant. For The World, I’m Marina Giovannelli.

China and US jockey on climate

The World — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:10:57 +0000

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China is going above and beyond in preparation for next week’s climage change summit in Copenhagen. Officials have come up with a plan for reducing greenhouse gases. But they’re also outlining ways to clean up its air, land, water, and in the process, its image. Anchor Marco Werman finds out more from Orville Schell of the Asia Society Center on U.S.-China Relations.

MARCO WERMAN: When the Copenhagen climate talks finally get underway next week, China will likely play a big role. China is now the largest emitter of greenhouse gases. It’s also emerging as a leader in climate and energy policy. Like the US, China has unveiled a plan, ahead of next week’s talks, for reducing its greenhouse gas emissions. But China is doing much more than that, according to Orville Schell. He directs the Asia Society’s Center on US-China Relations, and was recently in China.

ORVILLE SCHELL: They are doing a tremendous amount. A lot of effort in renewable energy, in wind and solar, tremendously aggressive program in energy efficiency, which what is proverbially called the low-hanging fruit, because if you can reduce the amount of energy it takes to produce let’s say a golf club or a toaster or something, you actually are able to pocket money. So the Chinese are very interested in that, because they can make money by becoming more efficient.

WERMAN: Is the Chinese government setting up solar and wind farms and did you see any of them?

SCHELL: Yes. They’re doing it very aggressively and they’re number two in terms of wind generation in the world. Their solar industries, which are not being marketed so much in China, but very aggressively abroad, are extremely well evolved and growing every larger. So they are making enormous steps in the fields of green technology and renewable energy technology. And I think in the last year or so, they have come to recognize that the economic future of their country will lie in this next great revolution. The post information technology revolution is I think undeniably going to be a green tech revolution.

WERMAN: Well the science is increasingly clear, climate change is happening and it will have significant, and in some cases, dire consequences: seal level rise, drought, flood, extreme weather. Is it fair to say that China has allowed the science to guide its policy making to a larger degree than the United States?

SCHELL: You know, curiously, the leadership in the central government is quite well apprised. Before President Bush left office, you had a real discontinuity, I think, in terms of the awareness that the Chinese leaders had of this issue, recently arrived at to be sure, and that of our present government. Now we have a kind of a curious switch where our presidential administration is very up to speed and aware of the science behind it, and in a certain sense is right at the same level as the Chinese central government leadership. But the problem is the US Congress. And in a certain sense, that’s not just Obama’s problem. It’s now the problem of the Chinese leadership too, because if the Congress doesn’t act, China’s not going to act.

WERMAN: With the Chinese waiting on the US and the US waiting on the Chinese, can either afford to wait out for one or the other to kind of give in on this?

SCHELL: Well that’s what we’ve been doing for the past ten years, and this is now the crux of the negotiation: who’s going to give what? So Obama is sort of trapped by Congress. He has a bill that’s passed the house. It’s committed to 17 percent cuts which is under 4 percent of the cuts that the Europeans have committed to, and the Chinese have also now committed themselves to a 40 percent cut by 2020 in what it costs to produce something in terms of energy. So how do you compare these things? That’s the problem we’re now at. Nobody quite knows how to get the apples to look like oranges and to be able to say, “Well, that effort is worth this much. Our effort is worth that much and it is comparable.”

WERMAN: With China’s growing political and economic leadership on climate and energy, I’m wondering if you can envision a scenario where they actually make the US in the future look to them as a leader on this?

SCHELL: Well, I do worry. One of the senses I had being in China with the whole Obama trip was that you really saw in the starkest way how the playing field has leveled. And Obama really arrived in China with no cards to play. He had no money. He couldn’t, on the climate question especially, really articulate what our position was, because Congress hasn’t passed a bill and he felt it would be counterproductive to do so. He finally did commit himself to a number, the number of the House bill, but that doesn’t really commit the US, so China’s still waiting. So that makes it very difficult for the US and China to actually come to an agreement in Copenhagen. I think they’ll try, but it will be a sort of an aspirational one on the US side, because Congress could blow it up in a heartbeat if they chose to.

WERMAN: Orville Schell is Arthur Ross director for the Asia Society Center on US-China Relations. Very good to speak with you. Thanks a lot.

SCHELL: Pleasure.

President Obama will go to Copenhagen

The World — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 21:17:41 +0000

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President Barack Obama is to pledge a cut in greenhouse gas emissions in the US in several stages, beginning with a 17% cut by 2020, the White House has said. The offer will be made at December’s UN climate talks in Copenhagen, which Mr Obama will attend. He does not plan to be there for the crucial last days. The talks will try to draw up a new global climate treaty to supplant the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. UN climate chief Yvo de Boer said his attendance could be vital for a deal. Anchor Marco Werman talks with our environment editor Peter Thomson about the President’s mission in Copenhagen.

MARCO WERMAN: So what’s going on with that big climate change summit next month in Copenhagen anyway? If you’re a little confused by now, you’re not alone. The meeting was supposed to produce a new global treaty to address the causes and impacts of climate change, but maneuvering by many of the major players in the past few weeks has made it hard to know what to expect from the conference. One thing we do know as of today is that President Obama will be among the world leaders in attendance. The White House announced this morning that Mr. Obama will visit Copenhagen on his way to Norway to accept the Nobel Peace Prize. Here to help sort out what this all means is The World’s environment editor, Peter Thomson. What will the President be able to accomplish, Peter, in a quick stopover at the summit?

PETER THOMSON: Well, his appearance seems primarily an effort to restore basically world confidence in the US’s commitment to strong action on climate, which has certainly been lagging in recent weeks. I mean, he came into office ten months ago, promising swift action on climate and energy policy after years of stagnation really, going back to the Clinton administration. But just about everything on his legislative agenda has gotten bottled up in Congress behind the healthcare debate, so that leaves the US still as the only major industrial country without a strong national commitment to emissions reductions. And he really needs to demonstrate some leadership to restore confidence that the US is serious here.

WERMAN: And given the stalemate in Congress, what can President Obama bring to the table?

THOMSON: Well, basically, what he’s decided to do it seems is to work off the numbers that have passed the House and are pending in the Senate. And essentially, that’s somewhere between a 17 and 20 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions from the year 2005 to the year 2020 and perhaps 80 percent by 2050. Now that may sound significant and it actually is, but it’s still a good deal less than what other countries have already agreed to under the existing Kyoto protocol, which is to reach similar targets, but based on a 1990 base level.

WERMAN: It’s all about greenhouse gas emissions and creating a treaty to limit them. That’s the goal of this conference. So I guess no one’s expecting that now. What is the new goalpost?

THOMSON: Well, it was actually the Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen, who proposed scaling back the hopes for Copenhagen to which Obama agreed last week. And he still wants to make sure that the Senate produces at least a basic framework for an agreement, and that would include at least specific pledges for emissions reductions by all countries, developed and developing, but under the principle established under the Kyoto Treaty, which is that of common but differentiated responsibilities by developed and developing countries, which basically means the developed countries have a responsibility to do more, because they created the problem and they are richer. And they do want to set a deadline for next year, maybe at a Mexico City conference next winter, to finalize all the details.

WERMAN: Obviously a lot of expectations dialed back for the Copenhagen summit. Peter, you’re going to be there in December. What are your gauges for success?

THOMSON: I guess for me as a journalist and a citizen, it really comes down to how close the agreement at this conference comes to meeting the challenge that scientists are telling us that we’re now facing, which essentially is that the problem is getting worse faster than we ever expected. There’s new repots coming out every few months that summarize the latest science and they keep telling us that. There’s a new one out just this week called “The Copenhagen Diagnosis.” Essentially it’s telling us that sea levels are rising faster than we thought, ice packs are melting faster than we thought, and that we really risk permanent, irreversible damage if we don’t act radically and act soon.

WERMAN: Peter Thomson, The World’s environment editor, thanks very much.

THOMSON: Thank you, Marco.

Copenhagen Climate Summit: Deal or No Deal?

The World — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 21:20:34 +0000

Negotiators from around the world are meeting in Barcelona this week in the last round of climate treaty talks before a global summit next month in Copenhagen. The Copenhagen meeting was supposed to produce a new treaty to address the rising threats from global climate change. But as the World’s Marina Giovannelli reports, prospects for an agreement this year are growing dim. Download MP3

MARCO WERMAN: I’m Marco Werman and this is The World, a co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI, and WGBH Boston. Time is the enemy when it comes to climate change and climate change negotiations. The clock is ticking as negotiators meet this week in Barcelona, Spain. It’s the final week of talks before a global climate summit next month in Denmark. That’s when nearly 200 countries will try to agree to deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. But as The World’s Marina Giovannelli reports time may be running out on prospects for an agreement this year.

MARIAN GIOVANNELLI: It’s been seen as zero hour for climate change. Amid a growing sense of scientific urgency world leaders agreed two years ago to meet in Copenhagen this December to finalize a new climate treaty. Now the deadline is approaching and the heat is on.

GORDON BROWN: We cannot afford to fail.

GIOVANNELLI: That’s British Prime Minister Gordon Brown speaking at the Major Economies Forum last month.

BROWN: If we fail now we will pay a heavy price. If we act now, if we act together, if we act with vision and resolve, success at Copenhagen is still within our reach. But if we falter the earth will itself be at risk and for the planet there is no plan B.

GIOVANNELLI: Climate scientists around the world back Brown’s sense of urgency. Reams of new scientific data suggest that climate change is moving even faster than was thought. But science and diplomacy each have their own timetables.

ELLIOT DIRINGER: Unfortunately I think it was unrealistic from the start to expect that we would get to a final agreement in Copenhagen.

GIOVANNELLI: That’s Elliot Diringer of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change.

DIRINGER: Perhaps the major constraint on these negotiations is the fact that the US isn’t ready to put numbers on the table and sing onto a binding commitment.

GIOVANNELLI: The US never adopted the 1997 Kyoto Climate Treaty and it remains the only developed country without a plan for emissions cuts. But the US is the largest historic emitter so much of the world expects it to take the lead. A climate bill is pending in the senate after narrowly passing the house earlier this year. But prospects for the bill are uncertain. And the Obama Administration says it won’t commit to an international deal without the backing of congress. One reason for reluctance in Washington is the fact that China and other developing countries won’t commit to specific cuts in their emissions, this despite the fact that China recently passed the US as the largest annual greenhouse polluter. But China’s position is starting to soften.

JULIAN WONG: We’re seeing China for the first time act on curbing its growth of carbon emissions. It announced plans to implement some sort of carbon intensity target going forward until 2020.

GIOVANNELLI: That’s Julian Wong of the Center for American Progress. He’s referring to China’s recent announcement of aggressive new clean energy targets that would sharply reduce its emissions growth. India has announced similar plans for its booming economy. The moves are part of the pre-Copenhagen diplomatic jockeying. But the issue of which countries should make what kinds of commitments is unresolved and it remains the biggest stumbling block to a deal. Another big sticking point is financing. Richer countries are responsible for most of the greenhouse pollution to date. So poorer countries argue that rich countries should help pay for the global transition to a cleaner economy. The issue of how much aid should be provided and on what terms also remains an open question and it’s unlikely to be resolved in the next few weeks. For many observers the growing likelihood that there won’t be a deal in Copenhagen is setting up the US as the fall guy. But Julian Wong says it’s important to remember that congress and the Obama Administration have had to make up a lot of ground on the issue.

JULIAN WONG: The US is moving very quickly to recover from eight years of inaction on the climate change front. So I think that there needs to be some realistic expectations on how quickly the administration and the government can move.

GIOVANNELLI: Such realism observers say means looking beyond Copenhagen to what British Prime Minister Gordon Brown might call a plan B. Robert Stavins who directs Harvard’s environmental economics program says negotiators might settle on the basic outline of an agreement in Copenhagen and then hammer out a detailed agreement next year.

ROBERT STAVINS: I don’t see Copenhagen as being the do or die moment. You know there’s a cliché that’s used about the American baseball season that really applies to climate policy. And that is it’s a marathon; not a sprint.

GIOVANNELLI: For The World I’m Marina Giovannelli.