No One Can Play Poker Like The US

by Joe Perullo There was a special Open-ended informal consultation on Wednesday organized by the president of the COP to discuss the possible Durban outcome.  There's no definition on what the outcome is right now, but it will for sure address the concerns arising from the potential elimination of the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol.  The US was second or third on the initial...

Climate From Space!

by Joe Perullo I decided to spend this morning perusing around the display counters.  They are mostly NGOs, national environment departments, and institutions who have something to say about what their doing in the fight for a more livable world.  I wanted to lean about the cool things some people are doing before I would be swamped trying to follow the political insanity bound to come in the...

Julian’s Intervention

Yesterday Julian Velez, representing the youth, had the great opportunity to give an intervention during the Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties (CMP), the main negotiating body that works under the Kyoto Protocol. The ability for civil society to give interventions is one of the only official avenues within the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change to express...

Technology Transfer and Intellectual Property Rights – Not as Scary as it Sounds

by Anjali Appadurai The climate regime is huge, transboundary, multidimensional. The UNFCCC, being the only body facilitating multilateral negotiations on climate change, is made up of a maze of different issues and tracks. The fundamental premise of the climate debate is that developed and developing countries are responsible to different extents for the current level of global emissions, but...

“Money doesn’t talk, it swears”

On the promise of the Green Climate Fund by Nathan Thanki Under the UNFCCC, expectations that the international community has regarding climate finance are clear. Article 4, paragraph 3 states that developed countries “shall provide new and additional financial resources to meet the agreed full costs incurred by developing country Parties in complying with their obligations,” and that there...