Videos to Watch: Climate week highlights, what's next in int'l talks

categories: Activism, Climate Security, Drowning Nations, energyefficiency, Environmental Justice, Forests, Fossil Energy, Greenhouse Gas, Humanitarian Relief, International Action, Interviews, Jobs & Economy, Nuclear Energy, Politics, Popcult

Published September 27, 2009 @ 02:43PM PT

Above: Climate advocates are striving to contain growing worries that the December climate talks in Copenhagen will be a bust. In this video made just as the G20 summit wrapped up, Kumi Naidoo, chair of the Tck Tck Tck climate mobilization campaign (and incumbent director of Greenpeace), encourages people to get active in their communities, churches, mosques, temples, and clubs. Naidoo and others believe it's crucial that citizens to contact their leaders and demand that they reach a "fair, ambitious and binding" climate treaty agreement in December.

It has been an inconclusive "Climate Week." The world's major economic powers made few significant moves on curbing global warming, and produced no major public breakthroughs in deadlocked climate treaty negotations.

On the activist side, things were a good deal more inspiring:

The Global Wake-up Call saw thousands of people worldwide performing creative, cheerful street actions and calling their political leaders to support a strong climate treaty. This "Human Countdown" in New York City last Sunday kicked off the week's activist events:

The film "The Age of Stupid" had a star-studded evening opening in New York City. The film takes a black-humored backwards look at our era, when no one acted fast enough to stave off global warming. Gillian Anderson! Moby! Heather Graham! Stephen Baldwin!
[[There, my SEO for the week is accomplished.]]

The Yes Men pranked New York City and the media with their mock "climate change edition" of the Rupert "Fox News" Murdoch-owned tabloid, The New York Post:

"SPECIAL EDITION" NEW YORK POST from The Yes Men on Vimeo.

More activist moments, and the anti-climatic policy roundup, after the jump.

Their individual climate change adapation strategy, the Survivaball, wasn't bad either:

As the media's eyes shifted west-southwest to Pittsburgh and the G20, Greenpeace activists performed a tricky action hanging a banner reading "Danger: Climate Destruction Ahead" off one of the city's many bridges. The group produced this agit-proppy video documenting the action, and the activists' hopes that President Obama will show leadership on taking strong action:

Youth climate activists from DC Action Factory were on-message about the G20's "climate fail" at Friday's "People's March" in Pittsburgh, not far from the site of the G20 summit.

The week's climate policy high points were a good deal more sedate:

Alliance of Small Island States demanded that the world's industrial nations keep the increase in the surface temperature between now and 2100 well below 1.5 deg. C above averages for the mid-1800s -- which would entail slashing greenhouse gas pollution much further than what's being discussed to date. Right now the major economies have agreed, somewhat hazily, to a 2 deg. C (3.8 deg. F) target.
"At two degrees," says Dean Bialek, U.N. representative for the nonprofit group Independent Diplomat, who is advising and assisting the AOSIS nations in the climate treaty negotiations, "the AOSIS nations will face totally unacceptable impacts." Which is to say, these low-lying islands will disappear from the face of the Earth.

While President Obama's opening address to the United Nations Climate Summit was hotly anticipated, it was Chinese President Hu Jintao who seized the day. He vowed that his nation would curb the growth of its greenhouse-gas emissions by a “notable margin” from 2005 levels by 2020. In his speech before the UN Climate Summit on Tuesday, Hu also said that China would generate 15 percent of its power from renewables and nuclear by 2020, and plant 150,000 square miles of new forest over that same period. He also committed to integrating climate action into domestic economic development plans, and improving energy efficiency. Yes, it's pretty vague. But it was a much stronger and more forward-looking statement than those made by President Obama. Al Gore lauded Hu’s statements, saying “I think that China has provided impressive leadership."

The Group of 20 major economies agreed to phase out fossil fuel subsidies, albeit in an as-yet-undefined "medium term." If they follow through, it will be a significant move -- likely to cut global greenhouse gas pollution by 10-12%, as well as making cleaner (and much less subsidized) energy sources more economically competitive with their dirty cousins.
It was the only climate-specific policy statement to come out of the Group of 20 (G20) Summit in Pittsburgh, however, and it fell far short of the hopes of climate activists, who wanted a firm proposal on “climate finance”—G20 aid to poor nations for help in adapting to and mitigating climate change.

Now all eyes turn to this coming week's UN climate meeting in Bangkok -- one of two remaining major milestone on the road to Copenhagen.

Share this Post

Comments (5)

The lead singer of the group Midnight Oil, Peter Garrett, wrote the song in the Tck Tck Tck action in NY. We got pretty excited when he was given the portfolio of Minister for the Environment in the new Rudd Govt. in Australia. Now that he wears a suit and tie (tie-symbolic of the submissive position?), he pretty much keeps to the party line.

Maybe the first step towards true climate change is to ban all neckties?

Posted by Oceania OZ on 09/27/2009 @ 03:58PM PT
- Report close
  You must be signed in to report content.
- Reply
- Like
For your comment to be published, you will need to confirm your email address after submitting your comment. In the process we will also create a Change.org account for you so you can track this and future conversations. Don't worry - we won't spam you. We just want to promote constructive dialogue and find that people are more respectful when they are not anonymous.

If you already have an account, click here to log in.

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

Create Password:

reply to thread started by by Oceania
Check Spelling
- Email me when there are new posts to this thread
- Comment Policy
Cancel Reply
I just want to make one more comment because I feel something is missing which should have a voice at Copenhagen. Where are the First Nation Elders? They come together every 4 years for World Peace and Prayer Day from all over the world. I think it would be necessary and right that they make a statement at Copenhagen by one of their nominees. After all, we could use someone there besides women who doesn't wear a suit and tie!

Posted by Oceania OZ on 09/29/2009 @ 09:15AM PT
- Report close
  You must be signed in to report content.
- Reply
- Like
For your comment to be published, you will need to confirm your email address after submitting your comment. In the process we will also create a Change.org account for you so you can track this and future conversations. Don't worry - we won't spam you. We just want to promote constructive dialogue and find that people are more respectful when they are not anonymous.

If you already have an account, click here to log in.

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

Create Password:

reply to thread started by by Oceania
Check Spelling
- Email me when there are new posts to this thread
- Comment Policy
Cancel Reply
Here's why :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqfvUA2vRAM&feature=player_embedded#t=523

Since this is a videofest.

Posted by Oceania OZ on 09/29/2009 @ 10:20AM PT
- Report close
  You must be signed in to report content.
- Reply
- Like
For your comment to be published, you will need to confirm your email address after submitting your comment. In the process we will also create a Change.org account for you so you can track this and future conversations. Don't worry - we won't spam you. We just want to promote constructive dialogue and find that people are more respectful when they are not anonymous.

If you already have an account, click here to log in.

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

Create Password:

reply to thread started by by Oceania
Check Spelling
- Email me when there are new posts to this thread
- Comment Policy
Cancel Reply
This one's even better :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9piIziXU9RE&feature=player_embedded#t=471

I'm going! I'm going!

Posted by Oceania OZ on 09/29/2009 @ 10:39AM PT
- Report close
  You must be signed in to report content.
- Reply
- Like
For your comment to be published, you will need to confirm your email address after submitting your comment. In the process we will also create a Change.org account for you so you can track this and future conversations. Don't worry - we won't spam you. We just want to promote constructive dialogue and find that people are more respectful when they are not anonymous.

If you already have an account, click here to log in.

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

Create Password:

reply to thread started by by Oceania
Check Spelling
- Email me when there are new posts to this thread
- Comment Policy
Cancel Reply
Thanks for the video links, Oz.

I actually don't know what sort of representation indigenous peoples have in the UNFCCC (International Framework Convention on Climate Change) -- it's a good question. Six Arctic indigenous nations have a permanent participant status on the Arctic Council, which is a high-level international group that produces a lot of research and recommendations on preservation and pollution.

One of the measures being negotiated into the "Son of Kyoto" climate treaty would involve near-unprecedented protections for global forests, which in turn would help many indigenous communities that still rely on these forests for their sustenance and survivial...assuming the measures are enforced.

Posted by Emily Gertz on 09/30/2009 @ 06:34AM PT
- Report close
  You must be signed in to report content.
- Reply
- Like
For your comment to be published, you will need to confirm your email address after submitting your comment. In the process we will also create a Change.org account for you so you can track this and future conversations. Don't worry - we won't spam you. We just want to promote constructive dialogue and find that people are more respectful when they are not anonymous.

If you already have an account, click here to log in.

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

Create Password:

reply to thread started by by Emily
Check Spelling
- Email me when there are new posts to this thread
- Comment Policy
Cancel Reply

Add a Comment

For your comment to be published, you will need to confirm your email address after submitting your comment.

If you already have an account, click here to log in.

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

Create Password:

Comment

Check Spelling

Email me when there are new posts to this thread
Comment Policy

Comments on Change.org are meant for further exploration and evaluation of the ideas covered in the posts. To that end, we welcome constructive comments. However, we reserve the right to delete comments that are offensive, abusive, or off-topic; that contain ad hominem attacks; or that are designed to subvert or hijack comment threads rather than contribute to them. Repeat offenders may be permanently removed from the site at our discretion.