Climatebytes's Blog

Two years ago nations from all over the world met in Bali, in an attempt to come to a global agreement to tackle climate change. The conference culminated in a plan, the Bali Action Plan, which chartered the course for a new negotiating process designed to tackle climate change, with the aim of being completed by 2009.

We are now in 2009 and this is why COP15 is happening.

On the 7th December 2009, 192 countries will take part in 2 weeks of talks in Copenhagen to establish and follow a new global agreement on climate change, because if global temperatures rise above 2C, the world in the way we know it will irreversibly change forever.

The only way this change can be slowed down is through global CO2 emission cuts, which will have to peak and decline within the next 15-20 years. Industrialised nations will have to set targets to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and developing countries, such as China, Brazil and India will have to think carefully about how they plan to continue expanding and emitting.

If global average temperatures rise, it means a few things will happen…here are a few examples:

- Ice caps and sheets will melt (too late, that one’s already started)- Iceland and both poles as we know them, will disappear, and fluffy Polar Bears will die leading to….
- Rises in sea levels- Places like Holland, Venice, the Maldives and even London will be affected, as they are all low-lying countries and cities, which will mean that people will want to move. This over a period of time will lead to….
- Mass immigration all over the world- hello Climate Refugees! This will not only be from rising sea levels, but it will be from people wanting to escape…
- Unnaturally hot areas and countries- People, plants, animals and water resources will not have time to adapt to the extreme conditions and many countries will not have the capabilities to plan for….
- Water shortages- so areas that already have water issues will get even worse, take Chad and Sudan for example where violent fights are already breaking out over water rights and
- Food shortages- will occur because it’s too hot for food to grow or there isn’t enough water.
- Extreme weather events and the El Nino Effect (hurricanes, extreme flooding, droughts) will increase- so imagine Hurricane Katrina happening more and more often.

- And they are just a few of the realities of climate change.

This is why a TOUGH deal is needed at Copenhagen on climate legislation. I’m not trying to be pessimistic here or be a sensationalist, they are just facts about what is, currently, very likely to come. It will not all happen immediately, you won’t wake up one day and turn on the tap to find there’s no water…but your children…or your grandchildren might.

COP15 is the last opportunity before governments and us as beings on this planet get the chance to stop these disastrous events from happening. This is what all the fuss is about and this is why I’m going, to make sure that I help put as much pressure on politicians and companies as possible to react and think about the future…..my future….our future.