A Climate for Change

Whatever agreements emerge from Copenhagen they will rely on people to enact them, both directly and indirectly. But it seems that people aren’t ready to embrace the need for change. According to The Times only 41% of people in Britain think that climate change is largely man-made, and even more worryingly, only a quarter of those surveyed think it’s a serious problem.

Lost the plot or?

Start of week 2 and reports indicate the waiting times at Bella centre have been getting longer. Late afternoon indications are that they have closed registration and will reduce NGO’s to 7000 individual max tomorrow, so the queues should be interesting…as of Thursday only about 100 NGO individuals will get in. Add to that the rumour that they are anticipating the high level segment will last until Sunday! So we continue to see pressure (both G77 and Annex I countries walked out of different meetings today but they have all reconvened behind closed doors) and focus but also an increasing sense of frustrating and confusion.

A weekend to remember in Copenhagen

Well the good news first it was sunny on Saturday and Sunday (Bella Centre closed but Minsters still meeting) which helped on Saturday when I got into the queue for the special additional passes we need to get into the COP as of Tuesday 15 December.

Halfway stage it may be but it does not feel like it at all.

Shipping, Sustainability and COP 15

Question - is this about the sustainability (read survival) of the shipping industry? - Or about how to implement sustainability in shipping?  The latter...whatever that means....
Thursday and Friday's events reminded me yet again that the shipping industry (whichever part we mean, have to wait for my illustration later in this blog) face a paradigm shift and a shift in understanding.

A little less or more Hopenhagen!

When I reported yesterday that the Chinese, UK and US delegations were publicly criticising each others proposals, Xie Zhenhua, the head of China's delegation and deputy chairman of the Chinese National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) had not given his Reuters interview. It seems that my comments yesterday were somewhat understated. 

Three Blogs for Day 3

On day three of the COP 15, Madlen King, LRQA's Global Climate Change Manager, joined Sean Cuthbert and Dr Anne-Marie Warris at the conference. So today there are three blogs, one from each of our on-site experts:

Hopenhagen

Madlen King

On arrival in Copenhagen it’s very clear that the locals remain hopeful. It appears that for the duration of COP 15, Copenhagen has been renamed ‘Hopenhagen’, and rightly so.

Day Two - CDM Discussions

Please read Andrew's pre-CDM DOE meeting post here

Today, the 10th DOE/AIE Forum took place in Copenhagen and, as expected, there was much debate and discussion on a number of key issues affecting the DOE community.

Siddharth Yadav (SGS), Chair of the DOE Forum, reminded those gathered of the issues which the Forum had discussed with the EB over the last year, including validation and verification timelines, post registration changes to project design, retroactive application of guidance, materiality, Programme of Activities liability, the definition of a ‘technical area’, and the implications of recent rules relating to conflict of interest.