2008 Woodie Awards
Climate conference looks toward future
United Nations Climate Change Conference receives critism for carbon footprints
Ben Brown-Steiner
Issue date: 2/18/08 Section: News
Last Friday, as part of the Liberal Arts Colloquium Series, Zack Swank, a Clarkson Senior, gave a presentation on his experience at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bali, Indonesia. He gave his first hand account as a representative for SustainUS, a nonprofit organization speaking for the youth of the United States regarding a sustainable future. He also gave an overview of the conference, showing clips and discussing the key moments in the two week conference.
The conference, held in early December of 2007, brought together over 180 nations to open a dialog and create a roadmap for creating a new international climate change agreement. Swank was careful to point out that, despite common belief, "the Bali conference was not meant to replace Kyoto," which is the current protocol and is due to expire in 2012.
Swank discussed how he was chosen as a representative six months prior to the conference, and how he and other members of SustainUS worked to represent the youth of the United States. At the conference, the eighteen members of SustainUS joined up with about 130 other students from around the world.
They had four main messages to express at the conference. First, they expressed how they wanted an 80% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions from the 1990 levels by 2050, which amounts to about 2% every year. Second, they discribed how climate change is a moral issue, and that you cannot negotiate with the laws of chemistry and physics. "There is a reckoning here," Swank said, "and it will need to be addressed sooner or later."
Third, the students demonstrated how the effects of climate change are already apparent. And fourth, and most importantly, they wanted to say that the future so often referred to as that of "future generations" is actually our future. Most of the youth living today will live past the year 2050, and it will be them, not their children, who will live with the effects of the current emission practices.
The youth representation also presented an award for every day of the conference called the "Fossil of the Day." The award was presented to whatever country was doing the most to block the negotiations. The award was accepted by a youth representative from the winning nation, and they gave a sarcastic and enthusiastic acceptance speech. This was one of the events that the youth representatives held that received a large amount of media attention.
The conference, held in early December of 2007, brought together over 180 nations to open a dialog and create a roadmap for creating a new international climate change agreement. Swank was careful to point out that, despite common belief, "the Bali conference was not meant to replace Kyoto," which is the current protocol and is due to expire in 2012.
Swank discussed how he was chosen as a representative six months prior to the conference, and how he and other members of SustainUS worked to represent the youth of the United States. At the conference, the eighteen members of SustainUS joined up with about 130 other students from around the world.
They had four main messages to express at the conference. First, they expressed how they wanted an 80% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions from the 1990 levels by 2050, which amounts to about 2% every year. Second, they discribed how climate change is a moral issue, and that you cannot negotiate with the laws of chemistry and physics. "There is a reckoning here," Swank said, "and it will need to be addressed sooner or later."
Third, the students demonstrated how the effects of climate change are already apparent. And fourth, and most importantly, they wanted to say that the future so often referred to as that of "future generations" is actually our future. Most of the youth living today will live past the year 2050, and it will be them, not their children, who will live with the effects of the current emission practices.
The youth representation also presented an award for every day of the conference called the "Fossil of the Day." The award was presented to whatever country was doing the most to block the negotiations. The award was accepted by a youth representative from the winning nation, and they gave a sarcastic and enthusiastic acceptance speech. This was one of the events that the youth representatives held that received a large amount of media attention.
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James Penna
posted 2/20/08 @ 4:18 AM EST
Carbon Dioxide ( CO2 ) is emitted by every living organism on this planet from man down to bacterium and yeast, even trees and plant life swing to the CO2 emitter mode in darkness . (Continued…)
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