Fossil of the Day Awards - Nov 3, 2009; Barcelona climate talks
Presented each day at the 2007 Bali climate negotiations to the countries who've done the most to block progress at the talks.
The fossils, represented by lumps of coal, are presented in an elaborate awards ceremony at 6pm daily at BICC booth 44 in Bali, hosted by Ben Wikler of Avaaz.org. The winners are chosen by a vote of the Climate Action Network each afternoon.
Want to receive Fossil of the Day alerts? Email Ben Wikler at ben [at] avaaz [dot] org.
The fossils, represented by lumps of coal, are presented in an elaborate awards ceremony at 6pm daily at BICC booth 44 in Bali, hosted by Ben Wikler of Avaaz.org. The winners are chosen by a vote of the Climate Action Network each afternoon.
Want to receive Fossil of the Day alerts? Email Ben Wikler at ben [at] avaaz [dot] org.
Fossil of the Day--and Year!
Third place goes to the UNITED STATES and JAPAN The USA and Japan win the third-place fossil nod (or, rather, disapproving head-shake) for their insistence—right through the night of the 13th—on keeping the range of 2020 emissions cuts for developed countries out of the Bali road map. It appears the US and Japan want a road map to nowhere. Coal for them!
Second place goes to THE UNITED STATES of AMERICA
The United States grabs a richly deserved second place fossil for behaving, over the last day, as though it were on another planet. Specifically: James Connoughton, chairman of President Bush’s Council on Environmental Quality, announced yesterday that “The US will lead, and we will continue to lead, but leadership also requires others to fall in line and follow.” And how did the US try to lead last night? By trying to scrap the Kyoto Protocol, proposing that the US be held to the same requirements as a developing country. The Bush administration, sadly, is showing no signs of developing.
Dishonourable mention: AUSTRALIA’S DELEGATION
Australia’s delegation to the summit receives a dishonourable mention tonight for their behavior throughout the last two weeks—doing a terrible job of representing an Australian public that clearly voted for vastly stronger action to confront climate change. Is it any surprise that many delegation members are holdovers from the Howard government? Time for some fresh faces, Australia—we don’t want to have to tap your coal supplies for next year’s Fossil Awards!
First place goes to CANADA
Canada scorches its way to the final first-place Fossil dishonours for its performance at the last two “Friends of the Chair” minister-level negotiation sessions—specifically, for NOT SHOWING UP. Environment Minister Baird is apparently so busy at the climate change negotiations that he can’t be bothered to do any climate change negotiating. It’s just the fate of the planet in the balance, after all.
Which brings us to the Fossil of the Year—the one, the only, the legendary COLOSSAL FOSSIL.
And the winner? A TIE! The United States, long-time champion—and Canada, behaving like a 51st State in George W. Bush’s America! Stephen Harper, congratulations—you’ve matched the master, and isolated Canada from the rest of the world by recklessly blocking progress in the fight against climate change. Your prize? A year’s supply of shame.
Full-page Avaaz ad in Canadian papers today
Read more here: http://www.avaaz.org/en/another_canadian_climate_crime/
Joint NGO petition delivery banner - 1:30pm BICC today!
…actually, the current total count is 2.6 million. But these things take time to print.
Thanks to the Internongovernmental Panel on Fossel Awards (IPFA) for this analysis. According to the IPFA, there is “a high degree of certainty” that Canada and the United States are doing the most to obstruct progress at the climate change negotiations in Bali.
2007 Fossil of the Day cumulative scores. Countries are given 3 points for a first-place win, two points for second place, and 1 point for 3rd place. Please note that, as the Fossil Awards are given to countries for blocking progress at the climate change negotiations, a higher score is bad, rather than good. Like golf. With the future of the planet at stake.
Fossil Awards for Thursday, Dec 13
Third prize: CANADA
Canada takes third for walking out of a high-level negotiation meeting long before the end of a crucial discussion. Yesterday, a “Friends of the Chair” meeting brought together 40 key ministers to work through tough issues that officials had not been able to resolve. In the midst of this, Canadian Environment Minister John Baird abruptly got up and left. Where was he going? He was spotted moments later holding a drink at a negotiation-free cocktail reception.
Second prize: UNITED STATES of AMERICA
The United States seizes second place for taking 20 of its alotted 5 minutes at this morning’s high-level roundtable on technology transfer—and using the time to talk about, well, anything but technology transfer. (Highlights included a discussion of the joys of nuclear energy and “clean coal.”) Throughout the COP, the USA has praised technology, but prevented progress on funding its spread through the developing world. On climate change, the USA is all tech, no transfer.
Dishonourable Mention for AUSTRALIA
Australia wins a rare “dishonourable mention” for claiming leadership on climate change—yet staying silent as the US, Canada, Japan, and Russia strip the Bali road map of the one piece of truly critical substance: the emissions cut range of 25-40% by 2020. As the saying goes, all it takes for Bush to flourish is for good prime ministers to do nothing. Australia: leading through silence.
First prize: USA, CANADA, JAPAN, and RUSSIA
The USA, Canada, Japan, and Russia share top honours—er, bottom dishonours—for relentlessly blocking any reference to the 25-40% cuts by 2020 in the Bali road map. The science couldn’t be clearer that cuts in this range are necessary to avert the worst of the climate crisis. Russia initiated the removal of the targets several days ago, and the USA, Canada, and Japan have fought to ensure that they don’t come back in. It’s like they’re piloting the Titanic, refusing to change course; except instead of merely hitting icebergs, they’re melting them.
Fossil Awards for Wednesday, Dec 12
Third prize: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
The US wins third for its last-minute efforts to block consensus on REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) in SBSTA—first by calling for deletion of the paragraph linking REDD to the Bali Road Map, and second by insisting on last minute wording, with unclear intentions, to link deforestation and degradation to broader land use considerations. If the USA can’t see the forest for the trees on deforestation, soon there won’t be any forest left to see.
Second prize: CANADA and the UNITED STATES
The USA and Canada share a second-place Fossil for working to remove language in the Dialogue on ranges of emissions reductions for industrialized countries beyond 2012, as well as language calling for a peaking of global emissions in 10-15 years. If the US and Canada want to be taken seriously on climate change, they should support numbers commensurate with the challenge. If they want to be known as the countries that blocked a serious response to the climate crisis, though, they’re on the right track.
First prize: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
The US wins first prize—for the second day in a row!—for blocking consensus in the SBSTA on sending the draft text on technology transfer to the COP. This proposal had seemed like the hoped-for way out of the impasse in SBSTA… until the US re-impassed it, in an impressive feat of impasse-ification. Coal!
Fossil Awards for Tuesday, Dec 11
Third place goes to CANADA, JAPAN, UNITED STATES, and AUSTRALIA
Third place is an unprecedented four-way split between Canada, Japan, the United States, and Australia for slapping the developing world in the face by repeatedly implying in the Dialogue that finance and technology transfer are second-tier priorities, rather than pillars of equal importance to adaptation and mitigation.
Second place goes to CANADA and JAPAN
Japan and Canada toasted Kyoto’s 10th anniversary by leading the way in blocking a strong reference to the 25-40% range for emissions cuts cited by the IPCC. These crucial targets had been removed from the AWG text; when a group of countries tried to return them last night, Canada and Japan objected. Ultimately, the reference to the 25-40% targets was only returned to the current AWG as one of two options. Of course, Canada’s own 2020 target is light-years away from what the IPCC says is neccessary to prevent a rise of more than 2 degrees, and Japan has been impeding strong targets throughout the COP—so their obstructionism comes as no surprise.
First place goes to the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
The USA wins a mega-fossil award for a litany of misdeeds:
* Flatly declaring that the UNFCCC is “not a sustainable development convention”… * and trying to remove the call for “sufficient, predictable, additional and sustainable financial resources for” adaptation in Article 1(c)(iii) of the Bali roadmap…
* and trying, in a press conference yesterday, to raise doubts about the Nobel-winning IPCC’s science by claiming “many uncertainties surrounded” the IPCC’s analysis due to its examination of only “a small subset” of possible climate change scenarios …
* and for falsely claiming that to include an ambitious goal for industrialized country emission reductions in the Bali roadmap would be to “start out with a predetermined answer” to the outcome of the negotiations
* and, most of all, for saying that the 25-40% cuts by 2020 are “totally unrealistic for many countries.” Here’s what’s totally unrealistic: any claims of US leadership on climate change at this summit.
