The Supreme Court opens the floodgates for corporate money to flow directly into elections. We’ll discuss how this stampede of special interests will affect climate change laws.
Joining host Mike Tidwell to discuss the implications of the Supreme Court vote is Rich Thomas, the general counsel and senior vice president of the League of Conservation Voters.
Then, what can Brown do for you? We speak about the surprise election to the US Senate of a Republican from Massachusetts – Scott Brown. Joining the conversation are two environmentalists who know Brown more than most. Jack Clarke is the director of public policy for Mass Audubon, the oldest and largest environmental group in the Northeast USA, and Lora Wondolowski, the executive director for the Massachusetts League of Environmental Voters.
There are less than 4 thousand wild tigers in the entire world. Now a new study shows how one out of every 10 of these tigers may be underwater within the next 100 years due to climate change. Joining us in our Washington, DC studios is Colby Loucks, the deputy director of the conservation science department at the World Wildlife Fund and the author of the new study in the scientific journal Climatic Change.
Image copyright World Wildlife Fund
Music for this edition of Earthbeat includes instrumental versions of Crystal Gayle’s “Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue,” and Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger.”Our theme music is Baladi by Tony Anka, Bellydance Superstars vol. 2.
****
To give to the people of Haiti affected from a massive earthbeatquake – we suggest Doctors without Borders, Partners in Health or Mercy Corps. Also, our friends at Other Worlds, with three decades of experience working with social movements in Haiti, have this message to share
with you: Other Worlds.
****
While the US Senate continues to stall on climate change – allegations continue into oil company lobbyists writing legislation suggested by Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski. Joining host Daphne Wysham to discuss these Senate shenanigans is Steven Biel of MoveOn.org and Courtney Abrams of Environment America.
Then we discuss presidential power and climate change with Kevin Bundy of the Center for Biological Diversity. He’s one of the authors of the new report “Yes, He Can.”
Then a critical discussion on agriculture and climate change. Rachel Smolker of BioFuel Watch joins us to discuss agribusiness, biochar and agricultural offsets.
Music from this edition of Earthbeat is by the Haitian band Tabou Combo from their album Taboulogy. Our theme music is Baladi by Tony Anka, Bellydance Superstars vol. 2.
As climate legislation continues to crawl through Congress, standing in the way of any real action on climate change are Senators who seem more concerned about oil company profits than climate change effects. On this hour of Earthbeat, host Mike Tidwell reviews two Senators who are obstructing climate change legislation.
Both come from powerful political families, both are Democrats, and both represent states that are uniquely affected by climate change.
Louisiana is arguably the US state that is most affected by climate change, and yet Senator Mary Landrieu has proudly proclaimed herself “the most fervent pro-drilling Democrat in the Senate.” Montana is the home to Glacier National Park and its forests are being ravaged by a explosion of beetles that now live through warmer winters. However Senator Max Baucus is proud to be the only Democrat to vote against climate legislation, and he did so be says its carbon emission targets are too high.
Then, the recent explosion in solar energy across America. Solar power is stronger, faster and cheaper than ever before. Joining us to discuss solar is author Amanda Little. Her book ‘Power Trip‘ describers her first-person journey across American to catalog our energy landscape.
Finally, a commentary by host Mike Tidwell about how – against the odds – we’re winning more than we’re losing when it comes to fighting climate change – based on his recent editorial in the Baltimore Sun.
Music: Two renditions of the Pink Panther Theme, one by Bobby McFerrin and a second by Alfred Choral. Our theme music is Baladi by Tony Anka, Bellydance Superstars vol. 2.
Coming down from Copenhagen – we review what happened, and what didn’t at the recent United Nations Climate meeting in Denmark. Host Daphne Wysham speaks to Erich Pica, the President Friends of the Earth, and Janet Redman the co-director of the Sustainable Energy and Economy Network at the Institute for Policy Studies in our studios; and joining us on the telephone just having returned from Copenhagen is Earthbeat co-host Mike Tidwell.
Washington Senator Maria Cantwell introduced a bill seeking to plug some of the problems with carbon cap and trade. The Friends of the Earth’s Erich Pica stays in our studios to discuss the bill with David Bookbinder, the senior climate counsel for the Sierra Club.
Then a conversation about the largest World Bank loan ever to Africa – for building two new coal-fired power plants. We speak to Sunita Dubey of the U.S. offices of the South African environmental justice group Groundwork.
Image via the Sierra Club’s Glen Besa, all rights reserved.
Image by Andrew Revkin, all rights reserved.
Friday in Copenhagen:
President Obama made his long-awaited speech here in Copenhagen just a few minutes ago and there was nothing encouraging about it. “The time for talk is over,” he said, and then failed to commit the U.S. to any new climate-saving actions.
“After months of talk, and two weeks of negotiations, I believe that the pieces of an accord are now clear… Mitigation. Transparency. And financing. It is a clear formula – one that embraces the principle of common but differentiated responses and respective capabilities.”
Unfortunately, there was nothing really clear or new about his speech. The President stuck to the previous U.S. weak commitment of a 4 percent reduction in carbon emissions below 1990 levels. This commitment practically assures climate collapse worldwide in coming years. He also simply repeated Hillary Clinton’s Thursday pledge that the US would “help secure” $100 billion per year by 2020 for poor nations coping with global warming.
The huge problem with Obama’s speech today was this: there was no commitment to a binding treaty leading the world to 350 parts per million carbon in the atmosphere. That’s the only level that Dr. James Hansen of NASA says is safe by the year 2100.
What Obama SHOULD have said is that the U.S. stands in solidarity with the 112 nations who on Thursday endorsed 350 ppm — or no more than 1.5 degrees warming by 2100 — as the goal for any meaningful climate treaty.
Here was the immediate reaction to Obama’s speech from 350.org founder Bill McKibben:
“In the face of leaked UN documents showing that this agreement is a sham, we were hoping for some movement from the President. Instead, his response was take it or leave it. 100 other nations are not making reasonable demands because they want to make the President’s life harder. It’s because they would like their countries to actually survive the century.”
Late Thursday I interviewed the prime minister of Tuvalu, a Pacific Island nation that will totally disappear with three feet of sea-level rise. Apisai Ielemia was fasting along with his entire diplomatic delegation here for 24 hours as part of the “International Climate Fast” called for by McKibben and others (I fasted too!). Ielemia made it clear that he would not sign a treaty that doesn’t commit to a pathway to 350 ppm. “Why sign something that guarantees my nation will drown?” he asked.
Exactly.
What will happen in the final hours of negotiating here? Rumors at the Bella Center are that there might be a “political agreement” for a goal of 2 degrees Celsius and a commitment to figure out the specifics of who will pay what toward the $100 billion-per-year goal for poor nations. But if that’s all that comes out of Copenhagen, then it’s basically nothing meaningful. We’ll just be kicking the can down the road to the COP 16 in Mexico City a year from now. That is UNACCEPTABLE. As President Mohamed Nasheed of the Maldives said last night in Copenhagen, “We cannot keep moving the goal posts on a climate deal. We have to stick to a deadline and solve the problem. The deadline is now. The place is Copenhagen.”
Just before Obama’s speech I had the fascinating experience of interviewing a correspondent with the Greenlandic Broadcasting Corporation. Katja Nyborg lives in Nuuk, Greenland, and is here covering the talks. She told me the warming in southern Greenland is now so bad that hunters are killing their sled dogs because there is nothing to sled on. The snow and ice are vanishing.
Katja Nyborg is a radio journalist from Greenland. She tells Earthbeat Radio that hunters there are killing their sled dogs because of vanishing snow and ice. But the warming, perversely, is bringing a boom in tourists who want to witness the climate calamity first hand.
The prime minister of Tuvalu also told me that there were almost no major beaches left in his island nation. “When I was a child in the 1960s, there were wide, beautiful white beaches throughout my country. Now they are almost all gone due to sea-level rise from global warming. We’re now just asking the world to let us survive.”
With firsthand testimonials like this, and with the maddening lack of real progress from world leaders, it can get discouraging here in Copenhagen. One testimonial that gives me hope, however, is my conversation with Australian Anna Keenan. She is on day 42 of a “climate justice fast.” And despite losing 33 pounds, she is amazingly full of passion and energy. She said a lot of people have called her courageous for doing this fast, which will end Saturday. But she agrees it’s courageous only in the sense of the original French meaning of the word “courage.” It literally means “raging heart.” (Please see that video interview below)
She said her heart of was full of passion, of hopeful and loving rage, to solve the climate crisis as a matter of justice toward all living things and all future human generations.
Here in Copenhagen, it’s hard not to feel some rage toward the dysfunctional international process — with huge responsibility falling on the U.S. But despite the challenges and setbacks, it’s also hard not to have a full heart — full of love and abiding hope — as you see all the world’s countries here, all the races, all the languages.
Miracles happen. The world needs one here in Copenhagen today. Let’s hope our leaders have the courage it takes to make it happen.
Steve Kretzmann of Oil Change International says America must finance clean energy development in poor nations by phasing out U.S. taxpayer subsidies to Big Oil and Big Coal. Watch the Earthbeat Radio interview from COP15 in Copenhagen.
Protesters at Copenhagen climate talks walk out on Wednesday, Dec 16th, over U.N. decision to dramatically limit participation by activists. Earthbeat Radio footage of a standoff with police outside the conference.
Jessy Tolkan speaks about the extreme frustration that U.S. treaty delegation is NOT listening to the voices of U.S. students. Tolkan is nationally recognized youth leader with the US based Energy Action Coalition
Copenhagen Update from Earthbeat Host Mike Tidwell:
As of Wednesday morning the international treaty talks have turned chaotic and discouraging. The summary: The United States is emerging more and more as the country blocking any meaningful progress. Despite efforts by activists worldwide to highlight the importance of 350 parts per million as the only safe level of carbon in the atmosphere, the US is doing its best to persuade all nations to abandon any talk of science-based reductions and simply wants to collect all the currently weak emissions reduction pledges and just crank out a watered-down treaty most convenient for America.
The scene here at the Bella Center in Copenhagen has been tense. Hundreds of activists and delegates walked out earlier this morning to protest the restriction of access. Many leaders of American climate NGOs are either already denied access to the center or will lose access soon. It’s a disgrace. Friends of the Earth activists and others have spent the morning sitting down in protest outside the center.
Security here and throughout the city is intense. Police dogs outside the center. Coming through the airport-like x-ray machines, I was asked to demonstrate that my water bottle was not poison by taking a swallow in front of security representatives.
I’ve talked to several leaders of the climate movement – including Gillian Caldwell of 1Sky and Jessy Tolkan of Energy Action – and everyone is sort of in a mixed state of anger, panic, and sadness. How can the US be so intransigent? Obama actually telephoned the presidents of Bangladesh and Ethiopia Tuesday to basically try to charm them away from science-based demands.
Danish diplomat Connie Hedegaard, official head of these treaty talks, told delegates yesterday you can leave on Friday in “fame or shame.” Tragically, the latter looks more likely at this point, although miracles can happen.
There appears to be some progress on rainforest protection today, according to the New York Times. But the two other main issues – financing clean energy development in poor nations and rich-nation commitments to serious emissions cuts – are totally unresolved.
I think Greenpeace International best described the current situation in the press release excerpt below. Also keep turned here to Earthbeat Radio for our continued coverage of the conference.
Greenpeace International statement Wednesday morning from Copenhagen:
“This situation is ridiculous and unacceptable to the millions of people around the world demanding that heads of state agree a climate saving deal this week.
“The talks are still stalled – because the industrialised country Ministers appear to have left their political will at home. Let’s hope their heads of state don’t forget to pack theirs” said Kaisa Kosonen, of Greenpeace International.
At the heart of the problem was the US’s insistence that governments abandon any idea of science-based, legally binding targets and instead try to simply add up any targets on the table and make that the overall outcome for the talks.
The US was also trying to toughen obligations on developing countries, whilst trying to get away with a weaker obligation on themselves.
“The US, the world’s richest country with the largest historical emissions is holding these talks hostage. If Obama doesn’t put new targets and long term finance on the table this week, he will be the leader remembered for causing a breakdown in Copenhagen and guaranteeing climate chaos,” said Damon Moglen of Greenpeace US.
The UN Climate meeting is underway in Copenhagen. Outside, massive street demonstrations and alternative forums outside the Bella conference center focus the energy of tens of thousands of activists. Inside, developing countries push for action against the foot-dragging of the U.S. and a handful of wealthy countries.
In this special edition of Earthbeat, host Mike Tidwell reports from Denmark. We hear from representatives of the thousands of activists who have been locked out of the center. Then, the stirring words from the President of the Maldives Islands, Mohamed Nasheed and the founder of the group 350.org, Bill McKibben about the desperate need for true action on climate change.
More posts and updates will be coming, so keep tuning in right here for updates all week!
Indymedia Denmark is running a radio show daily with reports and interviews from the street in several languages, as well as a continuous loop of past content.
Image by Adam Welz for 350.org, used for media permission, all rights reserved.
The United Nations climate conference in Copenhagen, Denmark is underway. Joining host Mike Tidwell to discuss what’s occurring during the official meeting is author and climate activist Bill McKibben, the founder of 350.org. And from the floor of the Copenhagen talks themselves is Jennifer Morgan, the director of the World Resources Institute’s Climate and Energy Program.
Peter Barnes joins us to discuss his views of the current status of climate action. Peter is is with the social justice group On the Commons based in San Francisco. He’s also the author of the book Who Owns the Sky? and a supporter of a cap and dividend way of combating climate change.
The debut of the new animated film The Story of Cap and Trade. Host Daphne Wysham, who recently penned an op-ed for The Huffington Post on cap and trade, speaks to narrator Annie Leonard and and the founder of Free Range Studios, Jonah Sachs, the animator. The Story of Cap and Trade is featured in The New York Times and creating a stir in the blogosphere.
"Earthbeat Radio does for environmental coverage on the airwaves what Grist Magazine does for the environment in the cyber world. Solid, deep, fascinating coverage, not the rushed Cliff Notes version you get buried in your newspaper. Earthbeat Radio provides the kind of reporting and interviews that keep a movement glued together. May it thrive."
John Passacantando - Former Director, Greenpeace USA
"In 2006, Earthbeat became our Friday 'luncheon listen' - it's been a great success."
John Cain - Station Manager KABF - 100,000 watts Little Rock, Arkansas
"Earthbeat is one of the best informed and most relevant programs to
focus on climate change. Wysham and Tidwell consistently zero in on
critical (if sometimes under acknowledged) aspects of the climate
crisis. And unlike many other environmental programs, which tend to
ghettoize the climate issue, Earthbeat is the only program I know that
treats this enormous challenge with the thoughtfulness, honesty and
depth it deserves."
