At the Frontlines of the Global Transition
Next month Interior Secretary Ken Salazar is scheduled to rule on a proposal to build one of the most contentious clean energy projects in the country. It is a 420-megawatt offshore wind farm in Massachusetts called Cape Wind. Audra Parker, the young leader of the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound, has emerged as a local public interest celebrity as a result of her work to prevent developers from constructing 130 turbines five miles out in …
COPENHAGEN — Seven countries, led by the tiny Pacific island nation of Tuvalu, this morning declined to accept the Copenhagen Accord that was reached late last night. But in a procedural move designed to put the agreement into effect, the conference decided to “take note†of the accord instead of formally approving it. Photo: J. Carl Ganter/Circle of Blue NGO experts explained that the decision by the other nations who are parties to the conference to …
COPENHAGEN — On the day that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton showed up to the United Nations climate conference to say that the U.S. would contribute to a global clean energy and climate action fund that could grow to $100 billion by 2020, Senator James Inhofe also appeared in Copenhagen. Earlier this month the Oklahoma Republican, one of Capitol Hill’s fiercest critics of climate action, told reporters that he would travel to Copenhagen with a …
COPENHAGEN—What a day here in Copenhagen. For much of the afternoon and well into the evening the cold and dark seemed to settle more deeply today on this city of 1.2 million. As morning turned to night no agreement was signed to save the planet. The meditation and prayer rooms were noticeably more busy in the Bella Center. After months of work this year, and 12 days of negotiation at the United Nations Climate Change …
COPENHAGEN – Like all spellbinding human dramas the United Nations Climate Change Conference, which today entered its second and last week, represents the accumulated chapters of an urgent script – the fate of the planet. Everybody in every corner of the world has a stake. Island nations, some of them starting to be swamped by rising seas, want huge cuts in climate warming gases to save their increasingly fragile economies and cultures. Arid nations already …
COPENHAGEN – Great social movements are about the intelligence and vision of individuals, and the compelling strength of crowds. Both have been in abundance throughout the first week of the United Nations Climate Change Conference, and especially today. Wearing polar bear costumes, red suits and dark glasses, black jeans and matching black t-shirts, and carrying a multitude of colorful signs aimed at speeding the pace of negotiations and results – “Bla, Bla, Bla. Act Now,†…
Photo: J. Carl Ganter/Circle of Blue Early morning metro riders in Copenhagen are greeted at every train stop by signs about climate change. Even the backs and sides of the city’s buses adorn messages of alternative energies and global warming. By Keith Schneider Circle of Blue COPENHAGEN — Lisa Jackson, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, pushed through a crush of visitors at the U.S. Center late this morning, stepped to the podium in …
COPENHAGEN – Among the hundreds of riders on this city’s automated, energy-efficient Metro rapid transit system was Isakwisa Mwamukonda, an environmental policy manager for the vice president of Tanzania. We had half a dozen stops between the tight-cornered streets of Copenhagen’s downtown and the Bella Center, site of the UN Climate Change Conference, to explore the promise as well as the perils of a global negotiation that almost everybody here hopes will achieve a new …
The House of Representatives passed a sweeping climate and energy bill last Friday, the first time a U.S. chamber of Congress has passed a bill that sets mandatory limits on greenhouse gas emissions. The American Clean Energy & Security Act passed the House with a vote of 219-212; 211 Democrats and 8 Republicans supported the bill. In his weekly address a day after the vote, President Obama said the legislation was “historic†and would “open …
In signing the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act today President Barack Obama ensured that $113.5 billion will be spent over the next two years on developing clean fuels, modernizing rail transit, pursuing energy efficiency, developing high-mileage electric vehicles, and scaling up electrical generating stations powered by the wind, sun, and heat of the earth. The magnitude of the clean energy investment – consistent with the sums spent to launch the Interstate Highway System in the …