Nathan Thanki

USA scores own goal by moving the goal posts

Nathan Thanki August 8, 2012 1 Comment

by nathan thanki There was quite a stink created this week when US Special Envoy for Climate Change (the big-shot who shows up late to the UN climate talks and gets interrupted by his constituents for not truly speaking for them) made a "remark" to his old College, Dartmouth. There was widespread condemnation of the apparent u-turn on US climate policy, which had previously agreed...

Has US given up on keeping warming below 2 degrees?

Nathan Thanki August 7, 2012 0 Comments

As we are now only 3 weeks away from crucial climate change negotiations in Bangkok (which will set the stage for this years 18th Conference of the Parties, in Doha), US Special Envoy on climate change - Todd Stern - has dropped a bit of a bomb during a speech at Dartmouth. Rather than stick to what the science demands, and limit global warming to 2 degrees celcius, Mr Stern is advocating for a...

Financing Adaptation: Who Will Pay?

Nathan Thanki July 18, 2012 0 Comments

by Nathan Thanki and Graham Reeder Given that we’re now experiencing another summer of bizarre weather events, including deadly heat waves, wildfires, and storms in the US, and increased chances of another El Nino year, many in the US are finally opening their eyes to what scientists have been telling them for years: climate change is real, but not only that, it is happening now. Climate...

Rio plus zero

Nathan Thanki June 22, 2012 0 Comments

by nathan thanki For a "once in a generation" event, Rio+20 felt an awful lot like déjà-vu all over again. For those of us enough to enter the lion's den of global multilateralism at the UN, the fact that governments could have ended last week’s “third Preparatory Committee to the Conference on Sustainable Development” (the pre-game to the big...

[Closing Statement to Rio+20]

Nathan Thanki June 22, 2012 0 Comments

The following is a a statement that was drafted by a group of people in the Major Group for Children and Youth. It was supposed to be delivered to the closing plenary of Rio+20, the UN Conference on Sustainable Development tonight (Friday 22nd June 2012). The UN decided initially that ALL of civil society (represented by 9 Major Groups) would have 2 minutes total in which to addredd world...