Communicating Climate Change in Everyday Conversation with a Skeptic

Communicating climate change is necessary, communicating climate change to skeptics is most important.

Climate change is a tough topic to bring about in the United States, increasingly so for the rest of the world due to a powerful skepticism movement. However, if we are to have educated responses and responsible voters there will need to an understanding of climate change for everyone that is affected. The current status quo of ignoring the issue will not do. It was Lord Stern, whose pivotal study the Stern Review is the most widely referred to report on the Economics of Climate Change that said "It is intensive public discussion that will, in my view, be the ultimate enforcement mechanism." Unfortunately, we are not there and it is due to everyday conversations and communication.

Problems in communicating climate change: for greater depth, our blogger Brian Kahn has put together a series regarding the challenges of communicating climate change. Global warming has already reached a consensus among most scientists (90% of the scientific journal Earth scientists believe the earth is warming. 82% believe that human activity causes the increase in climate temperature.) Brian goes into length three things: language, media, and visualizing. These three elements of communication are poorly utilized and the cause of such climate change illiteracy in the US.

Politics: climate change has become more than just a scientific phenomena briefly mentioned in textbooks or television ads. It has become a political issue, with a line drawn between conservatives and liberals; or more accurately between economists and environmentalists. Once political lines are drawn, the conversation turns away from facts and solutions to “who’s right and therefore better.” In that situation everyone loses.

It must be understood quickly that unless we can pull the issue of climate change away from being categorized as a political ideology or religious view we’re never going to have a fruitful conversation on climate change. Without fruitful climate change conversations we won’t have the “ultimate enforcement mechanism” Stern mentions above. In order to win, you must lose. That is to say, you must treat the conversation like a friendly transaction between two scholars looking for the truth, not trying to convince the other is wrong.

How an everyday conversation should go between a climate change skeptic and an advocate against climate change: first, the topic is brought up. “So what are your views on climate change?” Their answer may be: “It’s a natural cycle that happens every 10,000 years, not man-made.” Bingo, we have a skeptic. You could cite all the climate change reports you’ve read and they would put forth theirs. Or you’d be better to discuss probabilities. Climate change has this fat-tail problem: small probabilities for highly catastrophic consequences: one computer model has shown if we become carbon neutral at 550ppm (with a strong global effort) there's a 4.2% probability of reaching an 8C rise in temperature (Stern, 2008). Ask them: what if we’re wrong to ignore climate change? Would you have wanted governments to put up 1% of GDP to save lives? If nothing else, than just to save money? Turn the conversation away from who’s right or wrong and make it about what if we could have done something, just in case it’s as bad as or worse than what many scientists suggest. You’ll rediscover common ground with skeptics needed to do good for the future; we’ll build from there.

Photo Credit : Anders V

How Serious is China About Climate Change?

Many world leaders felt Chinese negotiators, including the Premier, were acting as obstructionists at the Copenhagen Conference of the Parties (COP) in December. Now, in an address to the media, Chinese Premier, Wen Jiabao, says he actually felt snubbed at Copenhagen.

One of the biggest points of contention was that Wen skipped a meeting of the world's top leaders in the waning days of the conference. In his addres, Wen said he was not aware of the meeting and that criticism of China hijacking the proceedings at Copenhagen are absurd. He also said China is committed to the Copenhagen Accord, which it helped craft along with leaders from South Africa, Brazil, India, and the US.

The fact that China recently signed on to the Accord indicates that China is still serious about international climate negotiations. Wen's statements further this position. While developed countries such as the US and England want China to take on similar emissions responsibilities to the rest of the developed world, it might not make the most sense. A recent report indicates that developed countries are outsourcing a large portion of their emissions to developing countries, particularly China.

China has benefited from those emissions through strong economic growth and a better quality of life for it citizens. While China has argument that developed countries should take on a greater burden in mitigating the effects of climate change holds some water, the economic benefits China has realized from accepting the role of the number one place to outsource emissions should not come without consequences.

If Wen's statement is to be taken at face value, then China should take on a greater role at COP16 in Cancun. Reducing carbon intensity, which the Chinese government has proposed, is not enough. China needs to be serious about finding way to reduce actual emissions. Remembering that all parties have the same goal should help the Chinese government find common ground with developed and other emerging economies like India, Brazil, and South Africa in setting up common but differentiated responsibilities.

The Cheap Political Gains of Questioning Climate Change

There are a number of disconnects in the US right now about climate change. One of the more interesting ones is the disconnect between the majority of our current elected officials and candidates running for seats in the House and Senate as well as possible presidential candidates.

Aside from some outliers (I’m looking at you, James Inhofe), most elected officials at the national level believe climate change is happening. Some are even looking to craft solutions before its too late. Senator Lindsey Graham (D), is still working with with Senators John Kerry (D) and Joe Liebermann (I) to craft a bipartisan climate change bill in the Senate to compliment the one already passed in the House. Its one of the rare moments where Senators are working across the aisle on a big issue.

It could become even more rare if some Republican hopefuls win office this fall. There are prominent Republicans such as Marco Rubio, who is running for Senate in Florida, and Tim Pawlenty, who is eying a presidential big in 2012, who have suddenly backed off of supporting climate change legislation. This is a change of pace from their stances even a few years ago.

Pawlenty supported capping greenhouse gas emissions in Minnesota earlier in his role as governor. Rubio, as leader of the Florida House of Representatives, helped get a unanimous vote urging the State Department of Environmental Protection to create rules for how companies operating in Florida could limit emissions. Both of them have suddenly had a change of heart about the science of climate change.

It would seem that their reasons for changing are purely political. The Tea Party movement coupled with oil and gas special interests have jerked the Republican Party to the far right on many issues including climate change. It’s dangerous ground to be standing on, though.

While short term gains by questioning the science of climate change could help Republicans pick up seats in the House and Senate, but they could diminish long term election chances. Lindsey Graham has warned that playing to party activists could alienate young voters, particularly in the future. He’s absolutely right.

The science may not be exact, but the trends are clear enough to know things are changing. Just because we aren't certain of exact temperatures or precipitation amounts in a given year doesn’t mean we should hold off on meaningful action to reduce emissions. Temporary political gains got by questioning the science will ultimately hurt Republican credibility as climate changes and more world leaders look to act to avert the worst effects of climate change. If people like Pawlenty and Rubio win election this fall or in 2012, they should enjoy the view from the top because they won’t be there for long.

Current Climate Change Series on Justmeans

Summary of current and new series at Justmeans.com: LEED Buildings, policy, renewable energy, organizations doing good work for climate change.

If it hasn't already become apparent, this climate change blog has a mother climate change blog at Justmeans.com. At Justmeans the number of excellent writers has doubled and in particular Brian Kahn has joined the family. He is in the middle of an excellent series on communicating climate change, be sure to check that out. Brian will be writing for climate change regularly, so be sure to follow him on as well. Other climate change series on Justmeans are also being published and a couple of new ones as well, they are:

The LEED Building and Energy Efficiency Series. This series will focus on the most successful green movement, LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) run by the most successful green organization ever created, the United States Green Building Council (USGBC). A rundown of credits and cost-saving measures will hopefully make it easier to understand why LEED is the future, today. It is an organization that exemplifies the triple bottom line: "People, planet, and profit." When I traveled to Denmark to learn from the nation’s world-class renewable energy programs, I learned that the most valuable thing they could still do was to increase energy efficiency of buildings. In the US, buildings consume over 72% of electricity and 30% of total energy (USGBC, 2010). Sustainable, green, and energy efficient buildings combat climate change, are profitable, and increase worker productivity and health.

The ongoing Climate Change Policy Series was originally designed to give a background of countries' climate change and energy policies leading up to the climactic (or anticlimactic) COP15 summit. It was the hope of this author, like many across the globe, that once the summit ended a global agreement on climate change would be signed. This would set us on the path of a concerted effort and a new series dedicated to new commitments would begin - maybe next time.

Another ongoing series is the Renewable Energy Solutions for Climate Change Series. Justmeans recently added an editorial category titled: Energy and Emissions, run by Paul Birkeland a former aerospace engineer and Brian Cotta a PhD in materials science, and that technically this series belongs there. However, it's difficult separating renewable energy and climate change, like separating sustainability and climate change. The problem is climate change and global warming; the solutions are renewable energy, efficiency, and sustainability.

The Organizations Doing Good Work for Climate Change Solutions Series. This can include companies, but a focus will be to dedicated climate change organizations. Submissions and press releases will only be accepted on Justmeans via messaging either me, Juan Carlo Pascua, or Brian Kahn. If you already have an account we'll scour your press releases on Justmeans as well, just be sure to follow the climate change editorial so that we may follow you as well, it's just easier to keep track of updates that way. Cheers!

The Specific Arguments For and Against Green Jobs: Climate Change or Sustainability

The specific arguments for and against green jobs, which are solutions to climate change or sustainability are discussed.

Green jobs combat climate change and even if climate change predictions do not arrive, many current or planned mitigation efforts are still worthwhile investments in sustainability. Any climate change project would create green jobs. In the unlikely even that climate change does not occur, we can rename the problem a need for sustainability and we’ll all still win. However, the argument continues: do green jobs exist?

The single most important piece of evidence that green jobs exist and will continue to create new jobs is the enormous amounts of investment into the green economic landscape. Billions of dollar are being invested into new companies and "Investment creates jobs." Specifically, the PERI (2008) reports six green industry sectors that are about to boom: building retrofit, mass transit, energy efficient automobiles, wind power, solar power, and cellulosic biofuels.

A UNEP (2008) reports $10 billion in investment were committed by leading investment groups by 2010, these groups represented $8 trillion dollars in assets. A Berkeley, California case study (2007) contained three noteworthy arguments for green jobs: 1) Green collar jobs are well suited for workers with barriers to employment - they offer low barriers to entry, meaning not even a high school degree is required; 2) people are interested in these jobs; 3) owners are willing to hire job ready applicants.

The arguments against green jobs focus on criticizing the meaning of the term “green job,” methodologies of the green literature, and paranoia against global economic change. Morriss et al. (2009) provide seven myths and their respective realities on green jobs:
Reason #1: There is no such thing as a green job because there is no uniformly agreed definition.
Reason #2: green jobs will not boost productive employment because estimates include huge numbers of clerical jobs that do not create actual goods or services for consumption.
Reason #3: the green jobs forecasts are unreliable because they are made upon poor economic models and dubious assumptions.
Reason #4: green jobs do not promote employment growth because they favor labor jobs over more efficient machines and technology.
Reason #5: the world economy cannot be remade because local modes of production are inadequate to supply the desires of any country; special outside firms would be needed.
Reason #6: mandates are not a substitute for markets, because companies react more swiftly to consumers than government entanglements.
Reason #7: wishing for technological progress is insufficient, because technologies preferred by green studies are incapable of reaching a meaningful scale to meet demand.

As mentioned before, the debate on whether green jobs exist is the same debate as whether climate change is real. They do exist (green jobs) and it is real (climate change). Climate change is the problem; green jobs are the solution. Wewill go into more depth in following posts to discover that even if climate change is not real, the cost savings we’d get in investing for green jobs for sustainability make green jobs the necessary future.

Climate Change is Just a Part of the Real Goal, Which is?

Solving climate change will be solve if we focus on this particular goal…

The goal is to be 100% free of oil and coal. The goal is to be 100% free of oil and coal; this point isn't drilled enough. Take any handful of supporters of climate change solutions and you'll get mixed results: the goal is to save the polar bears, the goal is to save the arctic ice, the goal is to prevent a nuclear attack... While these are all very worthy goals they share one common umbrella goal, which is the father of all these goals: the goal is to be 100% free of oil and coal. As China and India have shown this goal is not economically feasible, not at the moment. We need to make it economically feasible. Whether we set up a carbon cap and trade scheme or not, the goal must be met. Why we need to be fossil fuel free:

The first reason to be fossil fuel free is climate change. Take your pick: Polar ice melting, loss in biodiversity, extinction of polar bears, decreasing national security, decreasing public health, shrinking economy, job losses, strain due to large climate change caused migrations, the loss of the rainforests, increased drought and food shortages, drinkable water shortages- the list goes on and on. All caused by burning fossil fuels thereby increasing carbon emissions.

The second reason to be fossil fuel free is that we're going to be out of fossil energy in the not too distant future. Imagine an abrupt halt on everything going on in the world. An abrupt halt in lighting, heating, transportation, the internet, hospitals, patient care, cancer research, refrigeration of foods, etc - it all comes to a screeching halt. There is no doubt our world is run off of energy and as of right now coal, oil, and gasoline are all to disappear in a manner of centuries. We could procrastinate and begin solutions in the distant future. Sure, let's put up the solar panels then, but using what energy source? We need energy (fossil fuel) to make energy (renewables: solar, wind, hydropower, tidal and non-renewable nuclear).

We are at the start of the problem. We see it coming. We must act. The first step will be to increase energy efficiency. The second step will be to replace oil and gas. This stands to be the biggest challenge to overcome, as the natural path for business is the path of least resistance. That is to say, the most efficient path for a business to follow has to be the most cost effective and now and the indefinite future that path is fossil fuel. Step three will be to replace the non-renewable energy sources with renewable energy; and in order to do that we'll require a new infrastructure (smart grids, electric car charge stations, public transport) and energy storage technology (hydrogen fuel cells). There's a lot to do, but we’ll need to keep in mind the goal. What's the goal again? The goal is to be 100% free of oil and coal.

Fight Off Climate Change Skeptics With: Which Energy is not Formed from the Sun?

Fight off climate change skeptics by confusing them with the truth, ask: Which energy is not from the sun. It’s not fossil fuels.

Fun ways to stump a climate change skeptic. Skeptics like to halt climate change action by claiming "green is a religion" and use misinformation to build confusion. When coming across a climate change skeptic, the conversation will go nowhere, so you might as well have some fun trying to be educational. If you're in that situation ask them: excluding nuclear, which energy source does not come from the sun? Most forms of fuel/energy on the earth are derived from the sun. The sun itself is not a renewable energy source. It is destined to burn out and become a red giant, the kind of star that will run on helium fusion instead of hydrogen fusion; the sun at this size would engulf the Earth and global warming would take on a whole new meaning (in 5B years). For now, the sun is still the mother of all energy- except for one.

Oil, coal, and gas come from the sun; they are all forms of organic matter that decomposed. This organic material was once plants that captured the energy of the sun through photosynthesis or were organisms that ate these plants. The 'fossil' in the term 'fossil fuel' comes from the masses of microorganisms (phytoplankton and zooplankton) that died and were buried in the ocean (dinosaur fossils can also be potentially in the mix). The high pressures of the buried after-life combined with high heat transformed the organic matter, fusing it with minerals, thus creating oil and natural gas. Coal is most likely from decomposed plants.

Solar energy is the easiest to understand its sunny origins. Sunlight hits a solar panel and the chemical structure of the panel allows electrons to move producing an electrical current. Hook panels up to some batteries or an electric grid and there's instant power.

Wind is also sun energy. Wind is caused by the pressure differences on the surface of the planet. The poles are cold, the tropics are warm; what heats the tropics of course is the sun. More precisely: heat rises at the equator, where it is warmed by the sun, and it heads for the poles to reach a balance. On the surface of the earth the cooler air heads to the equator. The lateral spinning of the earth creates the Coriolis Effect which spins the wind in the east and west directions.

Tidal & Hydropower. Hydropower comes from dams and tidal from the ocean. These would be gravitational sources of power and therefore the only supply not derived from the sun. Hydropower allows water to build pressure behind a dam, when the water is released it will spin a turbine to form electricity. Tidal is a little more interesting, but the effect is the same, water pushed up by the tide will turn a turbine when the tide falls, thus producing electricity. There you go, fight the confusion of climate change skeptics with education, but best to avoid them when possible.

Nuclear Fusion a Solution for Climate Change: 50 Years Too Late?

A long time from now, a time far, far, far away... Nuclear fusion! Is it a climate change solution or a just a dream?

A popular saying is that "Nuclear Fusion is 50 years away... and that was fifty years ago." Nuclear fusion often gets confused with conventional nuclear power production, called nuclear fission. When people discuss nuclear reactors in conversation they are referring to fission, which is the process of creating energy by splitting atoms off a heavy radioactive element, usually uranium. In contrast, nuclear fusion is the process by which you take smaller atoms and combine them to make a bigger molecule and the end result is usable energy. For an easy visual: imagine slapping your hands together- this will be fusion. Now interlock your hands and quickly separate them- this is fission. In both instances something is created: sound. It's a little more complicated than that, but in principle it's a great start to understand.

Scientists long ago discovered the sun is run off of nuclear fusion; that hydrogen atoms colliding into each other to form helium and create the ball of energy at the center of our universe. Whether you're splitting or colliding atoms, energy is released like sound being generated when you clap your hands together or released them from interlocked fingers.

On earth, we don't create fusion by using hydrogen; we use deuterium and tritium, both non-radioactive, unlike uranium used in fission, which is radioactive. Radioactivity does occur: it is in the process of nuclear fusion that released neutrons will form radioactive isotopes in the walls of the reactor. Using the hand-clapping example, some of the sound created is harmful. The radioactivity has been addressed by using proper reactor wall materials. In doing so, after 100 years the waste will be no more radioactive than ash from a coal-fired power plant of the same size (RISO International Lab, 2007).

The fuels: deuterium and tritium are vastly abundant and evenly spread amongst nations on earth, which means less geopolitical clout on energy sources. Deuterium can be be extracted from water: just 1 cubic meter of water can produce 36g of deuterium, and the extraction process is cheap compared to the energy the deuterium would provide (RISO, 2007). Tritium is produced by bombarding lithium from neutrons in the fusion process. Worldwide, existing resources of lithium "would be able to power the world for a million years, and deuterium reserves would last for 50 billion years." Nuclear fusion always sounds great, just one problem: fusion is 50 years away, now where have I heard that before...

The current project is the ITER (iter is Latin for "the way") housed in France. ITER is based on the Topomak reaction design, or simply a hollow donut shaped tube where particles are accelerated to the point of collision hopeful creating fusion. Fusion is created, but the energy input is more than the energy output. It's like eating to get hungrier, and that's no way to power the future. For climate change the big date is 2050 to stabilize global warming; the best estimate for industrial nuclear fusion is 2045, too little too late. Nuclear fusion for now is a beautiful dream, but the world's been sleeping long enough. It's time to wake up.

Nuclear Power a Solution for Climate Change: Clean or Dirty?

At justmeans we've gone over UK: Climate Policy- it's going nuclear, but is it a solution for climate change?

Nuclear power- the word likely brings chills down the spine with images of chaos, green glow, hair falling out, melting skin, and all sorts of horrific consequences of a nuclear power plant failure. The UK has begun a process to commission 10 more nuclear facilities, to save the environment from global warming. Nuclear energy carbon-wise is clean and it certainly will last centuries longer after the last brick of coal is burned (some 200 years from now). To compare it with renewable energies: it is on par with GhG emissions, which are just produced in the initial construction phase. As clean as green, but not quite renewable, going nuclear is a likely energy strategy to support the future of the world. Of course there are some major problems to this major solution.

Concerns over nuclear power and the questions that most come up: where does the waste go? How is it treated? Why provide terrorists with an obviously devastating target? Although the last question always will remain difficult to answer- how does one account for unimaginable attacks- the answer to the first question is: currently the waste doesn't have an acceptable system of disposal. There are many proposal sites and the plan has always been to contain the spent uranium in an underground cave system. However, the proposed locations are not ready and non have begun construction. Think of having a city with thirty years of trash lying around everywhere, randomly, and that's pretty much how nuclear waste is handled. For the most part, waste is sitting around in the most imperfect ways.

Lack of nuclear engineers is also a grave problem. For the past 30 years there has been a decline in interest in nuclear power resulting in less funding. The decline is due to the fear created by the nuclear meltdown at Chernobyl (1986) and the leak at Three Mile Island, abbreviated TMI (1979). Chernobyl had highly exposed 600,000 people to radiation; TMI had a negligible effect on health. The public has since opposed nuclear power. To meet the potential need of a growing interest of nuclear for climate change and energy production that's carbon free, there needs to be 700 new graduates a year, according to ANS; currently there are only 250 graduates a year (USNews, 2008). 65 engineering programs existed in 1980 and now it is half of that. Lack of construction workers knowledgeable in their construction adds to the problem. The nuclear reactor Areva is building in Finland has seen some 3,000-construction errors resulting in immense delays.

Delays also arise from locals who oppose nuclear energy construction, so called Nimbys (Not In My BackYard). Yet, nuclear is gaining attractiveness in powering the future and powering off coal. The appeal is that nuclear plugs into current existing grids, unlike renewable energy which needs a costly infrastructure retrofit to handle the intermittence of sunlight and gusty winds. A secure and reliable energy program will need an assortment of technologies, including nuclear technology, nuclear fusion anyone?

550 ppm May Not Be Enough to Protect Against Climate Change & Global Warming

Summary:
550 ppm (parts per million) carbon dioxide equivalents explained; potentially dangerous despite best efforts.




Stabilizing at 550 ppm CO2e may not be enough to protect against the worst effects of climate change & global warming. To clarify further, if there were in total 1,000,000 'balls' of atmosphere, of the 1,000,000, 550 balls would be carbon dioxide balls (standard unit of greenhouse gases is CO2e - carbon dioxide equivalents). For the Copenhagen climate summit, 550 ppm is the target by 2050; the goal is to have no additional balls of carbon added to the atmosphere. Why? Because at 550 ppm the temperature has a 76% chance of not exceeding 5 degrees C. Good odds of getting to a dangerous temperature, but still avoiding catastrophe.

Currently the world is at 430 ppm CO2e (or 430 balls of carbon dioxide for every 1,000,000 balls of atmosphere). In pre-industrial times, around the 1850s, the world had 280 ppm of CO2e in the atmosphere (280 balls per 1,000,000 atmospheric balls). Every year the planet adds 3 balls into the air, or adds 3 ppm of CO2e into the atmosphere. In four decades the planet is extremely likely to get to 550 ppm CO2e. The likely outcome would be global warming temperature increase of 5C.

But that is just an estimate; it is reasonable to go beyond 5C at 550 ppm. Computer simulations consistently point to stabilization of carbon in the atmosphere to 550 ppm because it is extremely likely to occur by 2050, under "business as usual" (often abbreviated to 'BAU' in technical papers). By stabilizing at 550 ppm we hope to stop throwing balls of carbon into the atmosphere all together. By then we'll wait and see how much hotter the planet will get. Box 8.1 taken from the Stern Review (2007) reveals humbling percentages pertaining to carbon emissions levels. Once at 550 ppm there is a 7% chance of exceeding temperatures greater than 5 degrees C; there's a 2% chance of exceeding 6 degrees C; and a 1% chance of exceeding 7 degrees C. Humans have never experienced a temperature past 5 degrees C than what it is now.

So what’s the big deal with 5 degrees C? To compare a temperature change of 5 degrees C: 10,000 years ago the climate was 5 degrees colder than it was today and ice sheets extended from the North Pole down latitudes of present day New York. Doing nothing about climate change, the path of least resistance, may see us past a 7-degree increase of temperature. The consensus in science is that each year the likelihood of shooting past 550 ppm (and therefore 5 degrees C) by 2050 is growing. As Stern has suggested, if we limit throwing carbon dioxide balls into the sky now, the cost of success will be 1% of global GDP. As we've covered in the Justmeans American Climate Change Policy Series it would cost the USA $444B to cover it’s own losses under BAU, which equates to 3.7% US GDP. It's smarter and cheaper to act now; collective strength spreads the costs thin.

President Barack Obama to Attend the Copenhagen Climate Change Summit, Despite War, Accepts Nobel Prize

Summary:

Obama to announce carbon targets; attend Copenhagen summit later; accept Nobel Prize; surge in Afghanistan.






President Barack Obama is now to attend the later part of the Copenhagen climate change summit. "Based on his conversations with other leaders and the progress that has already been made to give momentum to negotiations, the president believes that continued U.S. leadership can be most productive through his participation at the end of the Copenhagen conference on December 18 rather than on December 9,” said Obama's press secretary, Robert Gibbs. His decision to shift his schedule from the beginning of the conference to the end may have come from criticism from Greenpeace, which believed that it would be better if he attended the end when agreements would finalize.

Obama's now abandoned scheduled was to visit Copenhagen on December 9 right before accepting the Nobel Peace prize in Oslo, Norway on December 10. Some criticize the president for attaining a Nobel Peace Prize despite his recent commitment to place 30,000 more troops in Afghanistan, making the total number of troops to more than 80,000. As previously mentioned, national security is an externality of climate change; poorer nations will buckle once climate effects devastate populations from many severe climatic events. A surge in Afghanistan will tie up US resources with the potential to spread troops too thin if another conflict were to arise. National security is also expensive, $657B being the price tag for the Afghanistan and Iraq wars up until 2008. The USA and the world cannot afford to allow climate change to cause a costly conflict. Developing countries are asking for $10B a year until 2012 to begin to mitigate climate effects. Mitigation now and swiftly remains the best solution.

In finding the best solution, Obama is expected to officially announce in Copenhagen his administration's plan to cut carbon emissions of the United States by 17% of 2005 levels. He also has plans to cut emissions to 83% by 2050, which fits well with the prescribed 80% cuts in carbon emissions of rich countries that Lord Stern prescribed in the Stern Review.

The last time Obama addressed world leaders about climate change was September 22. In his speech to the United Nations Obama professes: "As we head towards Copenhagen, there should be no illusions that the hardest part of our journey is in front of us." Obama warns:" Unease is no excuse for inaction. And we must not allow the perfect to become the enemy of progress." In closing: "The journey is long. The journey is hard. And we don't have much time left to make it. It is a journey that will require each of us to persevere through setback, and fight for every inch of progress, even when it comes in fits and starts. So let us begin. For if we are flexible and pragmatic; if we can resolve to work tirelessly in common effort, then we will achieve our common purpose: a world that is safer, cleaner, and healthier than the one we found; and a future that is worthy of our children. Thank you."