Internews' Earth Journalism Network (EJN) and its partners bring one of the largest cohorts of international journalists to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) summit, COP16, in Cancun this November, linking the high-level global summit to the real impacts of climate change felt by millions around the world.
Anti-Climactic: Politics trumps science at Cancún’s climate change talks—Will the same be said for New Mexico?
Laura Paskus - 15-Dec-2010
This story originally appeared in the Santa Fe Reporter on Dec. 15, 2010 http://www.sfreporter.com/santafe/article-5816-anti-climactic.html On opening morning of the United Nations climate talks in Cancún, Mexico, tour buses blasting air-conditioning crawl in traffic along the peninsula’s swanky hotel zone. The streets’ medians and shoulders are lined with state and municipal police cars, Chevy trucks and Dodge Chargers emblazoned with “Policía Federal.” Young men in Mexican army...
As climate talks close, get ready for post-conference blame game
Laura Paskus - 14-Dec-2010
This blogpost originally appeared in the New Mexico Independent on Dec. 10, 2010: http://newmexicoindependent.com/68321/cop-16-climate-change-evo-morales-... CANCUN, MEXICO — Since November 29, negotiators and world leaders have been meeting to find consensus on issues such as climate change, carbon emission reductions, adaptation and mitigation. Tagged “COP 16,” the meetings are the 16th annual Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (...
Show Him the Money! Reporter Joydeep Gupta asks tough questions at the Cancún climate conference
Laura Paskus - 14-Dec-2010
This profile originally appeared in the Columbia Journalism Review on December 13, 2010: http://www.cjr.org/the_observatory/show_him_the_money.php?page=all CANCÚN, MEXICO—Joydeep Gupta wants to know where the money is, and he’s going to keep asking everyone he can that very same question. Reporting for the Indo-Asian News Service, Gupta is in Cancún for the sixteenth annual Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, or COP 16. At last year’...
Global warming protesters ramp up with climate talks' failure
Margot Roosevelt - 14-Dec-2010
The failure of global climate negotiations to slow greenhouse gas emissions is fueling protest movements in the U.S. and other countries, as the effects of sea level rise, longer droughts and stronger storms begin to take a toll. More than 190 nations sent some 9,000 government officials, scientists and technicians to Cancun over the last two weeks, but the diplomatic arm-wrestling yielded little progress. That didn’t sit well with thousands of environmentalists and...
Google opens world's forests for all to see
Suzanne Bohan - 13-Dec-2010
CANCUN, Mexico -- With Google's new Earth Engine, anyone will be able to view forest conditions worldwide. When it launches next year, the online tool will provide satellite imagery of forests and will reveal where these woodlands have been razed or degraded by logging. With Earth Engine, small nations, nonprofit groups, independent researchers and everyone else will be able to assess an environmental crisis of growing magnitude: deforestation. No longer will these groups have to rely on a...
On last day of climate talks, environmental activists throw negotiators a lifeline
Kelly Benjamin - 11-Dec-2010
Originally Airred on WMNF Evening News, Tampa, Florida: 12.10.2010 Listen: http://www.wmnf.org/news_stories/civil-society-throws-lifeline-to-climat... At the beach in Cancun this morning, members of Greenpeace and TCKTCKTCK, an alliance of environmental organizations working toward an ambitious and binding climate change agreement, used a giant inflatable life preserver to throw a lifeline to delegates who are “drowning” (metaphorically) at the UN climate talks not far away. Kelly Rigg is...
A way forward: Agreements reached in Cancun
Sam Adams - 11-Dec-2010
This first appeared Saturday, Dec. 11, 2010, in Going Green in Cancun at www.kentucky.com Nations meeting in Cancun to address the effects of climate change reached agreements that most expect to be the framework for a legally binding treaty to be negotiated in the coming year, and perhaps be approved during a meeting in Durban, South Africa, in December 2011. Meetings lasted until 2 a.m. local time, when delegates approved the deal over the objections of Bolivia, which gained on support from...
Mexican state seeks to join California in carbon emissions effort
Katharine Eaton - 11-Dec-2010
Under a program, industries such as power plants could pay Chiapas to help save its rainforest in exchange for offsetting some of their own emissions in the U.S. By Margot Roosevelt, Los Angeles Times December 10, 2010 Reporting from Cancun, Mexico — The Mexican state of Chiapas, home to the left-wing Zapatista revolt of the mid-1990s, is now eager to join a most capitalist enterprise: California's upcoming cap-and-trade market for carbon emissions. Chiapas Gov. Juan Antonio...
At climate talks, the US has issues and Evo Morales calls inaction "Ecocide"
Kelly Benjamin - 10-Dec-2010
This story originally aired on the WMNF Evening News, December 9, 2010: Listen HERE. The United Nations Climate Change Negotiations are in their final 48 hours in Cancun, Mexico. WMNF’s Kelly Benjamin is there and reports that tracking down and speaking to the US delegation at the 192 country summit has been a bit of a challenge. I’m in a building called Cancun Messe, here at the United Nations Climate Summit, a large convention room that acts as a security gateway to the place the actual...
World waits for a decision in Cancun.
Sam Adams - 10-Dec-2010
This first appeared on Dec. 10, 2010, on Going Green in Cancun on www.kentucky.com By SAM ADAMS On the final day of the 16th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the atmosphere in Cancun has changed. I have been here for 14 days, and every day the number of emails and the number of Tweets on Twitter has increased. Not today. The 30-40 emails per night have ceased. The Twitter "fail whale" has yet to breach this morning. The delegates met...
Grenada Prime Minister at climate talks: cut carbon emissions now! Darryl Hannah: enough talk! Act!
Kelly Benjamin - 10-Dec-2010
Originally aired on WMNF Radio in Tampa, Florida: 12.8.10 listen HERE: The United Nations climate negotiations continued in Cancun today but hopes of coming to a strong deal on limiting global greenhouse emissions are looking more and more like a pipe dream. WMNF's Kelly Benjamin has been attending the talks and reports that Grenada’s Prime Minister Tillman Thomas, representing the Alliance of Small Island States, many of whom are feeling immediate effects of climate change, gave a...
U.N. Carbon Planning Opens to Indigenous Women
Laura Paskus - 09-Dec-2010
This story first appeared in Women's eNews on Dec. 9, 2010 http://www.womensenews.org/story/environment/101208/un-carbon-planning-o... CANCUN, QUINTANA ROO, Mexico (WOMENSENEWS)--At the opening ceremony of the United Nations climate change talks going on here, Simona Gomez Lopez, a citizen of the Mexican indigenous community, took the stage just ahead of Mexico's President Felipe Calderon Hinojosa. She talked of how she and other female potters who gather wood for their stoves have found new...
China makes waves in Cancún climate talks
Laura Paskus - 09-Dec-2010
This story first appeared in the New Mexico Independent on Dec. 8, 2010 http://newmexicoindependent.com/68267/china-greenhouse-gas-cop-16 CANCÚN, MEXICO — There are rumblings around Cancún that China may be willing to legally commit to its domestic cuts in carbon emissions. Negotiators, ministers and world leaders are currently in the second week of talks at the Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 16). Within that two-track...
On acronyms and opacity
Sam Adams - 09-Dec-2010
This first appeared Dec. 9, 2010, on Going Green in Cancun on the http://www.kentucky.com/greenspot By Sam Adams If there is one thing that is agreeable to all of the parties to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, it is the need for transparency. The United States has lamented the lack of transparency in the reporting of pollution output by other countries. Bolivia daily calls for transparency among negotiators. China says that every nation should be as a transparent as it is. But...
Climate Clash
Terri Hansen - 09-Dec-2010
Original story appeared in the San Antonio Current Native peoples struggle for survival at Cancún climate summit By Terri Hansen CANCúN, Mexico — Imagine you live on an island, a tropical paradise. Turquoise waters rise and fall at the shore’s edge. The ocean’s rhythmic sounds lull you into a sense of security. All feels right in your island home. Then reality hits: You’re a lifelong resident of an island in the Seychelles archipelago in the Indian Ocean and you’re 10 days away from being...
Hotsheet from Cancun
Suzanne Bohan - 08-Dec-2010
By Suzanne Bohan A VIEW OF U.N. TALKS FROM THE PACIFIC ISLAND FEDERATION Dec. 8 CANCUN, Mexico -- H.E. Marcus Stephen, president of Nauru and chair of the Pacific Small Island Developing States, on Thursday spoke here on behalf of fourteen low-lying island nation, including the Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu. At the conference, residents of these islands have told of...
Battle Rages Over Indigenous Rights and REDD at UN Climate Talks
Kelly Benjamin - 08-Dec-2010
Originally aired on WMNF Radio, Tampa, Florida: 12.6.10 listen here: http://www.wmnf.org/news_stories/battle-rages-over-indigenous-rights-and-redd-at-climate-talks The UN climate talks in Cancun are heating up this week with a clear division emerging on the issue of Forests and Indigenous Rights WMNF´s Kelly Benjamin is at summit in Mexico and files this report. You’re listening to the sound of a Machete held by a Mayan villager chopping the bark of off of a several hundred...
Riding the bus
Laura Paskus - 07-Dec-2010
This blog post first appeared on SouthwestReporter.com http://southwestreporter.com/blog/riding-the-bus On my bus ride to the COP 16 press conferences this morning, I sat next to a delegate from Senegal. We exchanged the usual pleasantries—Who are you with? Where are you from? How are things going for you in Cancun?—and then got down to the business of talking about COP 16. “Will President Obama come, do you think?” he asked me. “No,” I said. “I don’t think he’s planning on that.” My answer...
Richard Branson’s new climate project unveiled at COP 16
Laura Paskus - 07-Dec-2010
This blog post first appeared in the New Mexico Independent http://newmexicoindependent.com/68234/richard-bransons-new-climate-proje... CANCÚN, MEXICO — On Monday, Kevin Conrad, special envoy and ambassador for environment and climate change, Papua New Guinea, unveiled a new project from Sir Richard Branson. The Carbon War Room is a US-based nonprofit that “harnesses the power of entrepreneurs to implement market-driven solutions to climate change.” One of the features of its website is a...
