The largest summit on climate change in history opened Monday in Copenhagen, Denmark, with 15,000 participants from 192 nations. Government officials and representatives from the private sector, environmental organizations and research institutions, as well as 110 heads of state and government will be meeting for two weeks to negotiate commitments to cut emissions and agreements to finance mitigation and adaptation to climate change in developing countries.
Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen said that the presence of so many world leaders “reflects an unprecedented mobilization of political determination to combat climate change. It represents a huge opportunity. An opportunity the world cannot afford to miss”. “A deal is within our reach,” Rasmussen said. “The ultimate responsibility rests with the citizens of the world, who will ultimately bear the fatal consequences, if we fail to act”.
“The costs of responding to climate change will become progressively higher as time goes on,” said Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, who chairs the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. “Therefore, we must take action now.”
Here are some highlights from the week so far:
- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ruled that greenhouse gases endanger human health, allowing it to regulate planet-warming gases without legislation from the Senate.
- A new scientific study was released warning that sea level could rise much faster than previously expected. Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and authored by Martin Vermeer of Helsinki University of Technology in Finland and Stefan Rahmstorf of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, the study reports that global sea level could rise between 75 and 190 centimeters by the year 2010. The analysis was based on measurements of sea level and temperature taken over the past 130 years.
- The Sustainability Institute has launched an online tool that allows the public, journalists and other interested parties to track progress in the ongoing negotiations to produce an international climate treaty.
- 350.org, which organized a global day of action on climate change on October 24, is now calling for candlelight vigils on December 11 in support of an effective agreement in Copenhagen. Vigils throughout the world can be located at http://www.350.org/map.
- The Union of Concerned Scientists addressed the issue of emails that were stolen from the Climatic Research Institute at the University of East Anglia in Great Britain. Their site includes a link to An Open Letter to Congress from U.S. Scientists on Climate Change and Recently Stolen Emails
Coming up on Thursday, December 10, The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) will host a session in Copenhagen entitled Climate change and food security: unifying commitment and action in land-based sectors. This event will discuss how climate change, food security, and poverty – key challenges that intersect in land-based sectors – cannot be addressed in isolation from each other.