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  • Post-Copenhagen pledge: Coal free future begins in Kentucky

    This post was co-written by Stephanie Pistello, Ben Evans, and Ben Sollee, co-founders of the Coal Free Future Project. On the heels of the Copenhagen Climate Summit, we plan to make our own post-Copenhagen pledge here at home: It’s time to envision a coal-free future. It’s time for clean energy independence.   For those of us […]

    Jeff Biggers Climate & Energy

  • Christmas and Copenhagen

    The huge—and hugely disappointing, as far as the official results—Copenhagen world climate conference has just concluded. Since the worldwide celebrations of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth are coming up later this week, I thought I would study the words of Jesus in the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John to see if any of what he said there was of relevance to what just happened in Copenhagen.

    Ted Glick Climate & Energy

  • Copenhagen Prognosis: The ‘almost overwhelming challenge’ of a carbon-free civilization

    Cross-posted from the Wonk Room. A new scientific report, the Copenhagen Prognosis, outlines the terrible challenge the world faces from climate change — as well as several paths to safety. World leaders in Copenhagen struggled to come to a provisional accord that would provide a framework for sustainable civilization. But a team of the world’s […]

    Brad Johnson Climate & Energy

  • BBC World Service: Who is to Blame at Copenhagen?

    I just joined the BBC World Service for a live, hour-long program called “Copenhagen: Who is to Blame?” reflecting on the outcomes of the negotiations, including BBC’s environmental analyst, a Chinese policy specialist, WWF’s Campaign Director, India’s Vandana Shiva, and other experts (the podcast is available here, and for a cliffnotes version, start at 39 […]

    Teryn Norris Climate & Energy

  • Terminator 2009

    Cross-posted from TomDispatch. It’s clear now that, from her immoveable titanium bangs to her chaotic approximation of human speech, Sarah Palin is a Terminator cyborg sent from the future to destroy something — but what? It could be the Republican Party she’ll ravage by herding the fundamentalists and extremists into a place where sane fiscal […]

    Rebecca Solnit Climate & Energy

  • Stabilizing Climate: Beyond International Agreements

    Note: the following was written in July 2009, before the Copenhagen climate change conference. From my pre-Copenhagen vantage point, internationally negotiated climate agreements are fast becoming obsolete for two reasons. First, since no government wants to concede too much compared with other governments, the negotiated goals for cutting carbon emissions will almost certainly be minimalist, […]

    Lester Brown Climate & Energy

  • Earth to Thomas Friedman: Winning the “Earth Race” Requires Federal Investment

    In a major departure from conventional climate wisdom, Thomas Friedman argues in today’s New York Times that the UNFCCC framework is broken and should be replaced by a global competition in the clean-tech industry, which he says the United States can and should lead. “Let the Earth Race begin,” he declares, contrasting this with the […]

    Teryn Norris Climate & Energy

  • What’s missing in the Copenhagen accord?

    Climate delegates finally finished two years of negotiations Saturday by “taking note” of the two-and-a-half page Copenhagen Accord hashed out Friday night. It reminded me of a marathoner who slow-walks the course, hobbles across the finish line seven hours late, and then declares victory. Yes, there was a semblance of a deal by Saturday, but […]

    Noah Sachs Climate & Energy

  • Letter to Bill McKibben: don’t blame Obama for Copenhagen

    Dear Bill, Yesterday, in response to the end of the Copenhagen negotiations, you issued a press release with 350.org titled “The President has wrecked the UN (and the planet),” in which you wrote: “The president has wrecked the U.N. and he’s wrecked the possibility of a tough plan to control global warming. It may get […]

    Teryn Norris Climate & Energy

  • ‘There will be no decisions about us, without us’

    COPENHAGEN—The anger in Juan Carlos Soriano’s voice was clear when he rose to a podium in the Bella Center Friday afternoon. And it was easy to understand why: the climate-treaty talks were (and still are at this writing) stuck between competing draft texts, none of which offer plans to keep global warming within safe scientific […]

    Jonathan Hiskes Climate & Energy