If Virginia Gov. Robert McDonnell does it right, no one will need to fear his plan for big, offshore energy facilities along the state’s fragile coastline. If he does it right, we’ll never see a single oil spill, guaranteed. Even a major hurricane blowing through the region will result in zero pollution.
Bag tax: Local action, global import
The Washington Post
By Mike Tidwell
On the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, what environmental legislation should we celebrate most? What bill has really stood tall for our fragile planet? The Endangered Species Act of 1973? The Clean Air Act of 1990? Or … the District of Columbia’s plastic bag tax of 2010?
Tidwell's last radio show
In case you missed the live broadcast Tuesday, you can listen at www.EarthbeatRadio.org. It’s been a great 7.5 years as co-host. But it’s time to move on. I’m especially proud of the last 20 minutes of this show as I talk about how my wonderful son, Sasha, keeps me going as a climate activist. See full summary of the last show below.
Ebert, Romm and More
Listen at www.EarthbeatRadio.org
Host Mike Tidwell reviews the highlights of seven years of hosting Earthbeat. Including a conversation with famed film critic Roger Ebert on the significance of Al Gore’s movie,
A warming world increases atmospheric moisture, which leads to massive snowstorms
The Baltimore Sun
By Mike Tidwell
You can’t even find your car on the street, the kids have been out of school for days, and “blizzard conditions” is now standard weatherman talk in the D.C.-Baltimore region. So if global warming is happening, why in the world are we literally buried in snow?
Continue reading
Repairing Virginia's Economy
The Richmond Times-Dispatch
By Mike Tidwell
Gov. Robert F. McDonnell has been yelling it from the rooftops for months: The best way to repair Virginia’s ailing economy is to improve the state’s flawed energy policies. He’s absolutely right, of course, and now he faces a test. With inauguration festivities over, a landmark energy bill awaits McDonnell in the General Assembly. It would create lots of new jobs and, potentially, build badly needed bipartisanship in Richmond.
Winning more than losing
By Mike Tidwell
President Barack Obama’s chief science adviser, John Holdren, had this to say at the end of the rough-and-tumble climate talks in Copenhagen this month: “I think we’re winning more than we’re losing.”
Down to the wire in Copenhagen
The climate talks in Copenhagen remain deadlocked as many activists went peacefully back to the streets tonight to call for strong action. I joined about 500 activists, brought together by 350.org, for a torchlight vigil in a main downtown square. Expressing a shared sense of real disappointment, the crowd spelled out the words “Climate Shame” with the beautiful flickering lights. In the snowy night air, with Christmas decorations all over this city, it was both sad and strangely uplifting.
Civil Society spells out “Climate Shame” in downtown Copenhagen. (Credit: Robert vanWaarden/Spectral Q)
We still don’t know what final results will come from the talks involving 193 countries. But I’m trying to stay positive. Clearly there will be no binding treaty that gets us anywhere near the science-based emissions reductions we need. But the issues being intensely debated by the US, China, and the rest of the nations are critically important issues that must be resolved in any future treaty. Those issues, of course, are reduction targets, verification methods, and the financing of clean energy development and adaption in the developing world. Hopefully at least two of these three major issues can be resolved here: verification methods and finance.
That could leave for 2010 a final agreement on science-based reductions that get us on a pathway of 350 parts per million carbon in the atmosphere, the only level that leading scientists say is safe by the end of the century.
We’ll see what happens Saturday at the talks. So much is at stake.
Obama says nothing new while nations drown
Friday morning from 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 Continue reading
Copenhagen: Real treaty — not "drive-by hug" from Obama
Okay, here’s what’s really, really positive about the Copenhagen treaty conference now nearing its second week of talks: the activism. There are tens of thousands of citizen activists here: students, indigenous leaders, faith leaders. They are colorful and noisy and have really left a mark on the proceedings. On Monday, on the downtown streets of Copenhagen, I met a young Congolese climate activist who spoke the same obscure African language I spoke 25 years ago as a Peace Corps Volunteer. I was in the snow, in Scandinavia, speaking Tshiluba with a fellow climate activist from the Congo. Wow. We’re making progress.
And indeed the whole world is paying attention. If you Google “Copenhagen” today you get 43 million hits. But it’s unclear, just 48 hours from the end of the talks, what will happen here. The negotiating nations are still far apart on global emissions targets and how to finance clean-energy development in poor nations.
And now, tragically, with heads of state from 115 countries now arriving in full, the UN has decided to expel from the Bella conference center just about all the activists and other “non-governmental” representatives. The one really bright spot — the inspiration of grassroots voices — is being booted out of the room. Activists are now planning to gather elsewhere downtown for vigils, a “fossil” award ceremony that shames the most intransigent nations (the US has gotten two so far this week), and on Friday a giant aerial photo of activists forming the words “350 is Survival.” 350 of course is the level of carbon pollution leading scientists say is needed to save the planet. Right now, all the proposals from all the nations now officially on the negotiating table would actually lead the world by 2100 to about 770 parts per million carbon. It would be — literally — hell on Earth.
John Holdren, Obama’s own science adviser, told an audience here that the goal was to get the world toward 450 parts per million. The President’s science adviser seemed uninformed of the latest climate science.
Students staged a really big, inspiring demonstration in the middle of the Bella Center Wednesday to tell Holdren and other negotiators that compromise with the physics of climate change is not possible. We must commit to 350 now. Hundreds of students from over 40 nations sat cross-legged on the floor and read the names of 11 MILLION people worldwide who’ve signed a petition demanding a strong treaty. CCAN staffer Kat McEachern read the names of signers from Costa Rica, Latvia, and South Korea. Continue reading
Copenhagen: Chaotic and Sad
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 exerpt below. Also visit www.earthbeatradio.org for my complete radio broadcast from the conference, as well as video interviews soon with Jessy Tolkan and Gillian Caldwell.
Onward,
Mike Tidwell
Director, Chesapeake Climate Action Network
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. Lets 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.